TMA 02: Explore the claim that a consumer society is always a 'throw away' society.
Essay Plan
Intro
Introduce question: Explore the claim that a consumer society is always a throw-away society.
Rising levels of rubbish. DEF of environmental unsustainability. REF. pg. 115
Main Body
Paragraph 1
Mass consumption and rising affluence causes unnecessary waste.
Information provided from tables on pg. 110-111 showing rising income, and how much income is spent on items that aren't a necessity. REF. Individuals consuming to impress.
conspicuous consumption. REF to theorists.
Paragraph 2
Labour saving technologies and luxury items causing more waste.
More items seen as a necessity e.g tv, computer, mobile phone.
Labour saving technologies seen as a necessity for busy people, e.g. vacuum cleaner, iron.
Paragraph 3
The supermarket's power encouraging wastefulness.
7% of waste only being from the household. REF to page. Statistics of shoppers at the Big Four. The amount of travel the supplies do, and how much packaging and waste is caused. For car drivers.
Supermarket power.
Paragraph 4
Recycling saving waste. Recycling is now higher than ever.
The rubbish buisiness pp. 118-119. REF. Statistics of the increase in recycling REF, Pg. 117-118.
Revaluation, Recycling
Conclusion
Back to the question. Ongoing waste. Why always? Because it will carry on. Although recycling is higher, questionable whether it will stop 'throwing away' all together.
The purpose of this assignment is to explain the claim that a consumer society is always a 'throw-away' society.
The levels of rubbish in the consumer society continue to rise in the UK. In fact, “It was reported that in 2008 that UK households threw away almost 30 million tonnes of rubbish.” (Brown,2009,pg.107) Although the rate of household waste is high, there is also rubbish and waste by businesses to consider and this amount of rubbish has caused society to question...