Be Happier by Consuming Less Essay Example for Free

Be Happier by Consuming Less Essay Consumerist is a social and economic order that encourages the purchase of goods and services in ever greater amounts. In the American consumption, people do not know how much is enough, do we really need all we buy? Or we just buy it because everyone else has it? Does it make us any happier? In the article â€Å"The New Politics of Consumption: Why Americans Want So Much More That They Need† Juliet Schor shares with us her point of view about American Consumption. In Schor’s article says, â€Å"The average American now finds it harder to achieve a satisfying standard of living than 25 years ago† (411). Also that â€Å"The competitive consumption, the idea that spending is in large part driven by a comparative or competitive process in which individuals try to keep up with the norms of the social group with which they identify as a reference group† (412). Finally she believes that â€Å"Low income children are more likely to be exposed to commercials at school, as well as home† (413). Our personal consumer choices have ecological, social, and spiritual consequences. Much of what we purchase is not essential for our survival or even basic human comfort but is based on impulse, a momentary desire, and there is a hidden price that we, and future generations will pay for it too. The American economy’s ultimate purpose is to produce more consumer goods, not better health care, education, housing, transportation, but to provide more stuff to consumers. First, in Schor’s article she says, â€Å"The average American now finds it harder to achieve a satisfying standard of living than 25 years ago† (411). Nowadays people have to work longer hours than 25 year ago, to be able to pay all their desires. Having more and newer things each year has become not just something we want but something we need. The idea of more, ever increasing wealth has become the center of our identity, and this looks like an addiction. For example, my aunt Maria works 5 days a week to be able to pay all her bills and sometimes does overtime. She might have a lot of new and cool things, but she doesn’t even have time to enjoy all these things because she has to be working just to pay all she has. My aunt has a salary of $9. 25 per hour and getting a check of $740 biweekly which she have to use to pay her car $200, plus her phone $85, personal stuff $150, and the list keep going. I have worked 40 hours a week, going to classes full-time with little satisfaction. Without working that long, I am less stressed, and I prefer to learn how to spend less money, than spending more, and live stressed all the time. People should take more responsibility for themselves and their families and think outside of the box when it comes to life. Working less hours and buying fewer products is a good way to start. Also, Schor says, â€Å"The competitive consumption, the idea that spending is in large part driven by a comparative or competitive process in which individuals try to keep up with the norms of the social group with which they identify as a reference group† (412). People try to be in the same level that everyone else; if they see that somebody bought something, they will try to have that, just because that person has it. An example is the iPhones people are obsessed with them. The first iPhone was the 3G, then 3GS, 4, 4S, and the 5 that is the last one that just came out. All of these iPhones do almost the same functions; they just changed the size, and some other little things. People spend a lot of money buying the iPhones; the prices are between $300 and $500. The point is that people want to keep up with the newest things, just because other people will have it. For example, my cousin Heysus who is 23 years old, have been buying all the iPhones, because all his friends have them, and whenever came a new iPhone, he ordered it immediately to keep up with what his friends have. Another point is that people with less income, tend to watch more TV, in Schor’s article says, â€Å"Low income children are more likely to be exposed to commercials at school, as well as home† (413). Television and marketing are a big influence of how people spend their money. We watched an example of it in the movie of Super-Size Me, of how the companies spend a lot of their money on marketing, because they know that people is going to buy their products. We need to make people conscious about the problem that we all have as a society. Without our consumer impulse to buy the newest, coolest things on the market, there would be no market. People should think more about what they buy, and should not do unnecessary purchases I think that some people keep worrying more about what they can buy, and how they can have better and newest things instead of be worrying about how they can live happier, and less stressed. An individual does not necessarily have to live as a rich person to be happy. The thought of shorter hours working is a wealth of opportunity and adventure that no Disneyland or Las Vegas vacation can offer. It is actually stress-free and can help us to have time to more valuable parts of our life, like having more time to spend with our family and friends. Finally, as a student that works and studies at the same time, I have to be a smart consumer. I ask myself what I need and what I really don’t. Why do I need a car? Is it necessary to have a laptop when we have a library full of computers? We all need to learn that how to spend our money in a better way, and know that we do not need to have the newest and coolest things that the market offer us to be happy.

Plato :: essays research papers

Since the human beings came together and began to live communities, necessities to be administrated became the most important subject for human kind. There were said many things on this issue; there have been put many claims and interpretations on well, just and equal administration by many philosophers. They searched for the best administration that will guide people equally, just and well; that will provide sustainability, peace and prosperity between communities. In fact there are many forms of government that operating in the world. These regimes/forms of government are born from the characters of people who live in them and who are governed by them. It is necessary to mention something about Plato’s general theory in order to understand him very well. First of all Plato’s Republic is about a method of doing political philosophy. It is a systematic sustained treatence of issues, issues of just society, issues about state, issues about individual. These are all public things. He wanted to find an ultimate meaning of all these things; why they exist, how they should exist. He wanted to find absolute answer for these. So in this sense Plato’s Republic reaches old and known conclusion of major interests in their own right. His Republic provides epistemological and metaphysical combination for his political theory. According to Plato, a political society constitutes a natural whole that is own kind of excellent and well being. It means that society creates an aggregation individual, something more than that, and it has a natural existence. Individual and society can be defined as a unity and according to Plato a society and an individual are so similar that each has a proper and set of virtues. So for Plato, the character, opinion like attitudes of an individual are the product of society, and the individual has no existence without society. They imitate the society, if a society is right/just, the individual is right/just. Individuals drive their ability from society and they are trained in that way. According to Plato, the understanding of justice is about societal needs, which are common to all members of society. So society can satisfy members’ needs efficiently by dividing their labours. So people are born with their skills and virtues according to Plato. They would know these skill s and virtues when they grow up. If they are not fit for forming they should not do that. This is why importance/role of education come to discover each person’s skills.

An Insight into Academic Writing Essay

Authors Gerald Graff and Cathy Berkenstein claim in their book, They Say, I Say, that academic writing is not about â€Å"playing it safe and†¦ piling up truths and bits of knowledge,† like many people assume. Rather, it is about the dynamic interaction between other people’s points of view and the author’s response to those perspectives. In chapter one of Graff and Berkenstein’s book they emphasize the necessity of balance when implementing certain writing â€Å"moves,† specifically, when introducing a counter-view, summarizing other’s arguments, and when quoting someone else’s words. Graff and Berkenstein contend that by opening an argument with an explanation of what the thesis is responding to–introducing a counter-view–gives the main point clarity and relevance. They encourage stating the opposing view or assumption initially so that it will define and explain what the thesis is addressing. But, they also caution the writer not to bloat their introduction with extraneous information for fear of losing the audience’s focus and engagement. What Graff and Berkenstein suggest, then, is that â€Å"as soon as possible you state your own position and the one it’s responding to together, and that you think of the two as a unit. † Basically, they insist that the best way to give a â€Å"genuine response to other’s views† during academic writing is to have a balance between introducing what â€Å"They Say† (the opposing point of view) and what â€Å"I Say† (the writer’s response). If being in a constant dialogue with others’ positions is essential to arguing persuasively, as Graff and Berkenstein claim, â€Å"then summarizing others’ arguments is central to [the writer’s] arsenal of basic moves. † All too often during a summary, writers will provide their own opinions on an article’s topic rather than revealing what the article is actually stating. On the opposite extreme, there are the writers who â€Å"do nothing but summarize,† which dilutes their own views in an ocean of someone else’s ideas. Graff and Berkenstein remind us that a â€Å"good summary requires balancing what the original author is saying with the writer’s own focus. † In other words, an exceptional summary contains the perspective of the original author, while emphasizing the points the responding author wants to address. One of the best ways to initiate an effective argument is not only to summarize what they say, but to quote their exact words. According to Graff and Berkenstein, â€Å"Quoting someone else’s words gives a tremendous amount of credibility to your summary and helps ensure that it is fair and accurate. † By quoting someone else’s exact statement it serves as a proof of evidence that you are not just fabricating another’s claim, but that you are disclosing their true ideas. Like introducing a counter-view and summarizing, quoting requires that you find an ideal balance between the quantity of quotes and content of commentary. A common issue with quoting is when the author assumes the quote speaks for itself. As Graff and Berkenstein, quotes are like literary orphans that have been taken from their original context, â€Å"they need to be integrated into their new textual surroundings. † In simpler terms, a quote needs to be introduced, interpreted, and then connected to the central idea. I found chapter one of Graff and Berkenstein’s book, â€Å"They Say,† to be extremely interesting and useful. The way they tied all their information to a central idea, while explaining how to do just that fascinated me. I felt like their writing had a constant flow from introduction of a move, to implementing balance, to common problems, how to fix those problems, and then to exercises that would reinforce their primary concepts. Their style and content kept me engaged and focused. Also, I learned a handful of writing tactics, like introducing a counter-view, summarizing, and inserting quotes, that I was not one-hundred percent sure on how to do prior to the reading. Overall, I found the chapter to be engaging, informative, and beneficial to me and my writing style.

Enron Essay - 1885 Words

As Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind portray in The Smartest Guys in the Room: The Amazing Rise and Scandalous Fall of Enron, there was a chain-reaction of events and a hole that dug deeper with time in the life-span of, at one time the worlds 7th largest corporation, Enron. The events were formulated by an equation with many factors: arbitrary accounting practices, Wall Streets evolving nature and Enrons lack of successful business plans combined with, what Jeff Skilling, CEO of Enron, believed was the most natural of human characteristics, greed. This formula resulted in fraud, deceit, and ultimately the rise and fall of Enron. Kenneth Lay created Enron in 1985 as a result of the merger of Houston Natural Gas and Internorth. Within a†¦show more content†¦Next came Californias rolling blackouts caused by Enrons traders. By turning the power off and on in California, they could control the price of electricity, essentially stealing peoples money. Because they could manipulate the price, they made hefty bets on it, and in turn made over $2 billion dollars for Enron. Just before the fall of Enron, the insiders sold off nearly $1 billion dollars prior to the annunciation of the bankruptcy of Enron. What caused so many executives and employees to behave in such a fraudulent way? As Skilling put it, the biggest motivator for humans is money. Enrons executives received large quantities of stock options, motivating them to manipulate earnings which would cause an increase in the stock price. The nature of Enrons executives also played a big role in influencing employees to display similar characteristics of aggression, arrogance, greed and dishonesty. Executives at Enron were known to take extreme dirt-biking trips to places like Mexico, where they could dangerously travel 1200 miles of rugged terrain. Stories of broken bones, stitches and flipping jeeps became legendary at Enron, and fed the macho personality of the employees. Top management gave its managers blank orders, to just do it (60). In turn, employees attempted to not only crush outsiders, but eachother. Skilling encouraged this behavior, saying he wanted them toShow MoreRelatedEssay on Enron975 Words   |  4 PagesThe fall of the colossal entity called Enron has forever changed the level of trust that the American public holds for large corporations. The wake of devastation caused by this and other recent corporate financial scandals has brought about a web of new reforms and regulations such as the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which was signed into law on July 30th, 2002. We are forced to ask ourselves if it will happen again. T his essay will examine the collapse of Enron and detail the main causes behind this embarrassingRead More Enron Essay1056 Words   |  5 Pagesname to Enron. Around that time Washington was being lobbied by energy corporations to deregulate business and let companies set their own prices. 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