You have to blame parents then it's nothing to do with older generations. Parents not teaching their kids financial wisdom from their own mistakes. I don't think you can blame old Mary down the road for the fact Apple spend billions on marketing. You can only blame the person, their upbringing, education and parents. I know someone who comes from a wealthy background, went to private school, had a nanny, walked into a grad scheme earning £50k a year straight after uni and he buys cheap Chinese crap off Amazon. MPow headphones when he could easily afford apple, Bose, beats, etc. So how come he knows a £30 of headphones is the smart option and not £400 airpods?
Parents taking the easy option of shoving a tablet, TV, phone in their kids hands Vs having to spend quality time with them. I've seen it myself the difference between households. I have nephews which play musical instruments and are part of an orchestra, one that plays for 2 football teams and others that just sit glued to a screen all day.
What's the difference? The parents. I'm sorry you can't blame the older generations for people being sheep.
No you're not understanding.
A child now is influenced by the actions of the generation in front of it. Its the 20 year olds now who are creating all the you tube contents, running the marketing in companies creating the intrinsic need to buy things, be perfect etc.
In turn, their parents, the 40-50 year olds, are the ones who are benefiting most from all the products which are bought by the 20 year olds. Its their companies that make them. Its their companies which provide the credit for the 20 year olds to buy them etc. Its their companies and the technologies they developed that enable all these outlets for marketing these days.
In turn, their parents, now 70-90, were the ones who created the societal enablers that let those 40-50 year olds make all those products and give all that credit. They were the ones that voted in the monetary and political enablers for it all. They were the ones creating the technological revolution. They also were the ones that most benefited from excessive pensions and cheap houses.
Why did any of those generations do what they did? For money and personal success of course. It is all a chain of events that goes back to post war which was a big reset and time of change in society. None of it was vindictive, all those people along the chain believed they were doing the right thing and they were. They were creating success for themselves, adding value and making money for their companies and the country.
The issue now, as with all things eventually, is that it becomes unsustainable and exploitative. Our economy relies on ever increasing growth, but there isn't enough money to fuel it forever. So ever more dangerous mechanisms are created to keep it going. That's where we are now.
So coming back to the point, you are saying that its the fault of kids or their parents why many people have this materialistic view of the world but it isn't. It is a cycle that has taken hold over decades and multiple generations. A set of desires is ever marketed, going hand in hand with technological improvement, and we are under immense pressure to live up to those ideals we see on the TV or everywhere in our lives.
Our economy would fall apart if these desires immediately disappeared because our 'growth' is reliant on it. Tax income, jobs and whole industries, the NHS - all reliant on people spending money this way.
Your friend who buys Chinese knock offs instead of Apple air pods, well fine. These things dont apply universally to everyone nor in equal measure. Perhaps your friend doesn't buy airpods but perhaps he owns a nice car, or perhaps he buys a lot of high end products for his showhome. Or, perhaps your friend is the one actually sitting near the top of the pyramid scheme, the one making the money from all the crap bought by the plebs. We are all trapped by this whether you like it or not.
