Discuss: The Gospel of Consumption

I appreciate your inquriy jawnybnsc.  I’m just not sure where you get this idea the Europe is abandoning its social contract.  there are occasional calls for more business flexibility (eg Denmark, Finland) and some tightening of welfare due to the influx of immigrants, but virtually no european political party, Left or right, calls for going the US model—Europeans are appalled by such an idea.  One Dutch conservative party leader I spoke with told me his party is the party of the right in Holland but their views are far to the Left of US Democrats.  German is no exception to the rules. Germans work among the fewest hours in Europe—350 less than we do.  they get 30 days of vacation and generous other perks.  Denmark, with 30 days vacation, is rated as having the best business climate in the world and the Nordic countries are all considered as competitive as the US in the world economy.  We don’t have to work people to death and ruin their health.  europe has proven that.  If its policies were such a failure why would American investors invest far more each year in Holland than in china and more in Belgium than in India?  It’s the European elite that spreads these myths (along with corporate America) not the average European.  the elites wish they could make 400 times what the average worker makes like US CEOs do, instead of the 40 times as much they do make.  You can find all these comparision in the 2007 OECD Fact book and from many other sources.

The thrust of my argument has less to do with Europe’s policies and more to do with Europe’s politics.  Clearly there is a shift taking place.  Just as clearly, that shift has some basis in the attitudes and desires of the European electorate.  I’ll grant everything you say about Europe’s policies and about current European economic dimensions.  What I do still wonder about is a changing political vector that, in my mind at least, raises doubts about Kaplan’s thesis.  My argument is not about the merits, per se.  My presumption was that the electorate was choosing a different path because they felt that they were on the wrong course.

This is a terrific article.  Thank you for digging through the history and the statistics. 

I’ve posted a link to this article on my blog, Dangerous Intersection, where I periodically post on issues relating to rampant out-of-control consumerism.  See, for example, “We are drowning in material goods, yet we crave ever more stuff.”

http://dangerousintersection.org/?p=737

John . . . what is your response to this BBC article about French voter attitudes on the 35-hour workweek?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6625583.stm

jawnybnsc:  it’s true there has been some push back, particularly to the 35 hour work week and people are disatisfied with certain aspects of life, but there is simply no call out there by any party to get rid of the long vacations, the shorter workweeks, the paid family leave, the oppotunities to work part-time without losing benefits.  these aspects of the social contract, plus health insurance, free higher ed, etc.  What does receive more support is Sarkozy’s call to increase the age of retirement.  All the european countries know they must do this because they don’t have the demographics to support people for 30 years of retirement; there aren’‘t enough young people in the workforce.  therefore they are experimenting with raising the retirement age (below 60 in some countries) and phasing in retirement.  this is why Sarkozy took this on first with his attack on the pensions of the transport workers.  With the 35 week, he hasn’t cut that out only given workers who want to the right to work 39 hours instead.  No European leader is advocating the US system, not even Sarkozy.  the British Tories published a Blueprint for a Green Economy last September that advocates far more free time for people as a key plank.  I’m not saying everything you mentioned is wrong, only that calling Europe a failure is far too broad a statement.

I walked back a bit from that one.  I meant that the model was a failure, not Europe.  Further, I’ll agree with you that it’s a strong statement.  What I really wanted to get at was a discussion of the political trend in Europe and you’ve accommodated.

It doesn’t make so much difference what we want, but what given the current state of things what we can have.  With 6 billion people heading toward 9, we are going to have to deal with some pretty heavy issues.  We can wake up a change our modus operandi or we can hit the wall.

Euope is only a failure to those who fail to appreciate that not all cultures are puritanically adverse to pleasure and enjoyment of life as it is.