Political/Economic (1998)

Conspicuous Consumption

Different nations spend their money on different necessities. American’s prefer to consume unnecessary items such as cosmetics, while Europeans prefer to consume unnecessary items such as ice cream. Developing countries are not able to consume unnecessary items and are stuck using old technologies for their energy sources; that is a process called “leapfrogging”.

The more a neighbor spends, the more you are going to spend. Dr. Robert H. Frank's theory talks about how we compare our lavish items to those around us and, therefore, end up spending more on unnecessary items because we are in comparison.