Juicebox Winter. 2014 | Page 21

does damage in a similar way . Like how a drug baron will bully the little people into poverty and keep the profit all to himself , big brands are doing the same . To keep the stock price up , the companies we shop from ignore the bitter irony of a child in the third world sewing together the school uniform for a child the same age in the first .
Even if the workers involved in the making of products and growing of cheap food were paid fairly , and their countries ’ economic growth not stunted at the expense of our taste for the cheap and cheerful , we ’ re all still pretty screwed anyway . For example , if everybody lived like an American , there would be a lot of problems . Aside from every other person carrying a handgun and never being able to find decent cheese , we ’ d also need the land and resources of four earths to keep us going . If we all lived like the French , we ’ d need two and a half . If we all lived like the people of the United Arab Emirates , we ’ d need five and a half . At any rate , we ’ d need a lot more earths than we actually have to keep going .
This is part of the reason why the ‘ little people ’ on the other side of the planet are exploited . It ’ s not just because they can keep us in inexpensive beef and jumpers , it ’ s because if they all lived like us there wouldn ’ t be enough food for everyone . We ’ d all be middle class kids , addicted to our little luxuries . We ’ d all want it all . And who would make it all ? If the whole planet demands a living wage , then there ’ s nobody who the west can pay £ 8 a month to grow cocoa beans and cotton plants and the consumer economy collapses . Bummer .
So the pretty shameful status quo we have at the moment stops us running into a pretty epic catastrophe for everyone . While the situation is unacceptable in so many ways , a lot of people will argue somebody being paid £ 1 a week is better than someone having no job at all . This seems to be the argument a lot people will use to excuse the metaphorical lines of consumerism they ’ ve been snorting . Well put down the credit card and listen , because the traditional tables are starting to turn . I ’ m sure we can all remember since we were children the stamp of ‘ Made in [ insert faraway poor county here ]’ being on the bottom of everything . Whether it ’ s a Made in China Mattel something in 1996 or a Made in India Primark something in 2006 , this may not be the case forever as these countries get richer and richer .
The middle classes in countries like China , India and Brazil are expanding faster than an American ’ s waistline on Thanksgiving . Within a couple of decades , the amount of people in each of these nations ’ middle income brackets will surpass anything Europe and North America have ever seen . Right at this moment , China has just become the biggest market for luxury goods in the world , and western possessions and pastimes are the ultimate expression of wealth . With this comes aspiration to drive a BMW , remake your home to look like an Ikea catalogue , and eat more meat than a Texas ranger . In fact , environmentalists are saying over and over than the increased levels of beef consumption in countries now eating a more western diet will lead to serious economic doom and gloom . Apparently if the BRIC economies keep it up with the Big Macs , we ’ ll have to consider eating insect protein by 2030 .
It ’ s not only a skyward rate of consumerism addicts in the developing world that are going to send us shopping ourselves into an early grave , it ’ s the terminal increase in population . By the time most of us are about sixty in 2050 , the world ’ s population will be 9.7 billion , which makes current estimates of 7 billion look like a drop in the overpopulation ocean . That ’ ll be 9.7 billion people all wanting food , shelter , medicine , water and a source of income . And while it is developing countries that will bear the brunt of the growth , we in the UK won ’ t get off easy either . The demand for resources will hit us hardest , as scientists and population analysts estimate that the resources that Britain has naturally can provide for 15 million maximum . With our national population hitting 70 million ( ish ) by the late 30 ’ s , our issue is symptomatic of what ’ s happening worldwide .