The marketing of consumerism

Here's a fascinating article on how the culture of consumerism beat back the prospect of a shorter work week and more free time.

 

...If as a society we made a collective decision to get by on the amount we produced and consumed seventeen years ago, we could cut back from the standard forty-hour week to 5.3 hours per day—or 2.7 hours if we were willing to return to the 1948 level.

 

http://www.orionmagazine.org/index.php/articles/article/2962