What’s wrong with that sentence?
First, define luxury. Second, who is we?
Most dictionaries will define luxury as
something involving comfort and/or elegance, and being expensive to obtain.
The luxury of comfort then could include: a home that
is able to be heated in winter and cooled in summer; readily obtainable meals
that are nutritious and tasty; a car fitted out with surround sound, Bluetooth,
and push-button adjustable seats; holidays once, twice, or more times per year
in a location of choice reachable by international flights; a large-screen
television; comfortable and stylish clothing; a washing machine, dishwasher,
clothes dryer. microwave oven, an air fryer; an outdoor pool with an electronic
BBQ nearby; an investment property or two; a share portfolio providing passive
growth and/or income ….
In short – all the mod cons. It’s a comfortable life.
It may be argued that only a few of these are expensive.
Then wait. There’s more to come.
Before going further, who is we?
A question? In what income decile of the population
would you have to be to afford these luxuries? Let’s say the top decile – i.e.
the top 10% of income earners.
Now, here’s the rub. What income does someone need to
be in the world’s top decile of income earners?
It turns out to be just US$20,400 per year (A$30,000
if you live in Australia for comparison.)
Doesn’t sound like a lot does it. It would be easy to
look around and point out that “I’m not as well off as that person, or that
person, or that person…”
Easy to say if our vision is restricted to our
cohorts, our peer group, or the society we happen to live in. But, if our perspective
is broadened out to encompass the whole world, then US$20,400 is a high income.
Let me say too, before the objections come, this figure is adjusted for cost of
living from one country to another.
Now, it is possible to answer the question of who
is ‘we’? ‘We’ are the citizens of the wealthy, rich nations of the world.
Of the 20 richest nations per capita, 10 are in Europe, 5 in Arabia, 3 in Asia,
plus the USA and Australia. The highest ranking South American nation is Guyana
at 44th. The highest African nation is South Africa at 92nd.
Of the 176 nations with identifiable income levels, 18 of the bottom 20 are
African nations.
Furthermore, that US$20,400 is thirty-eight (38) times
the income level of the bottom 50% of the world’s population. Thirty-eight
times!
The we identified above are living in luxury.
Two groups of people are paying for this luxury. One group are all those living
at poverty levels; levels that are way way less than US$20,400.
The other group, ironically, are the we. We are
paying for it with high rates of obesity, diabetes, and other diseases of luxuriousness.
Additionally, there is a third player that is paying
the cost of our living in luxury – the planet itself. The planet is suffering
from our disease of consumption.
On the first page of their ground-breaking book on inequality
epidemiologists Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett warn that ‘… the truth is
that the luxury and extravagance of our lives is so great that it threatens the
planet.’1
Luxury – An earlier definition
It is time for us to remind ourselves of what the word
luxury originally meant. In the Old French language, the word luxurie
had connotations of debauchery, dissoluteness, and lust. Prior to that, the
Latin word luxuria meant excess and profusion.
Isn’t this exactly what our living in luxury has
brought us to? Excessive and profuse consumption leading to debauchery (doing
too much of something that is not good for us, or for the planet) and dissoluteness
(acting without moral – or even material – constraint.)
By the 14th century the word luxury
had taken on association with lasciviousness and sinful
self-indulgence.
Are these historical and etymological meanings of luxury
closer to a proper denotation of living in luxury today?
Notes:
1. Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett, The Spirit
Level: Why equality is better for everyone, Penguin Books, London, 2009.
No comments:
Post a Comment
This blogsite is dedicated to positive dialoque and a respectful learning environment. Therefore, I retain the right to remove comments that are: profane, personal attacks, hateful, spam, offensive, irrelevant (off-topic) or detract in other ways from these principles.