If getting and spending define our lives, then Juliet Schor now has us covered. Six years ago, her book The Overworked American scrutinized the getting part. It focused public attention on the disappearance of leisure and the harmful effects thereof on families and society. It sparked a debate over whether Americans really work as much as we proudly claim. (If so, how to explain the audience for Monday Night Football?) Nevertheless, Schor can take credit for helping push Congress into passing the Family Leave Act in 1993.

Now she is back with a critique of our spending. Schor notes that, despite rising wealth and incomes, Americans do not feel any better off. In fact, we tell pollsters we do not have enough money to buy everything we need. And we are almost as likely to say so if we make $85,000 a year as we are if we make $35,000. Schor believes that "keeping up with the Joneses" is no longer enough for today's media-savvy office workers. We set our sights on the lifestyles of those higher up the organizational chart. We seek to emulate characters on TV. For teenagers, "enough" is the idle splendor that hardly exists outside of what MTV un-ironically calls The Real World. Schor offers an original and provocative analysis of why many Americans feel driven and unhappy despite our success. As an alternative, she profiles several "downshifters" who've taken up voluntary simplicity in search of a more satisfying way of life. No policy solutions suggest themselves this time, only a change of heart. --Barry Mitzman


From Publishers Weekly
Whereas Schor's 1992 bestseller, The Overworked American, touched a nerve among all classes of American society, her latest study is geared to middle- and upper-middle-class consumers who, in her diagnosis, are participating in a national orgy of overspending and living beyond their means. She traces this competitive, status-conscious consumption to the diverging income distribution and growing inequality beginning in the 1980s, as increasingly overworked, insecure, dissatisfied consumers, pressured by advertising and television imagery, sought to emulate the upscale lifestyle of the most affluent. An economist and director of women's studies at Harvard, Schor presents her arguable conclusion that the more TV a person watches, the more he or she is likely to spend. In counterbalance, she also reports on her nationwide survey of "downshifters," people who deliberately reduce their hours on the job in exchange for more leisure, time with family or other pursuits. In self-help fashion, she outlines nine steps individuals can take to break free of the cycle of compulsive spending. Although Schor's jeremiad lacks the impact of her earlier book, it offers trenchant commentary on Americans' overspending lifestyle and lack of savings. Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
The dual purpose of this slim volume is to describe how spending, as a process, affects the quality of life for the middle and upper classes and to show how to develop a life that puts materialism and consumerism in proper perspective. Economist Schor states that in the 1950s "keeping up with the Joneses" held sway; today, however, purchases convey status and identity with our reference groups, e.g., co-workers, media stars on television, and those with similar values, not necessarily our neighbors. Schor argues that rampant advertising and consumerism is driving an unsatisfying materialist life. She also describes "downshifters," those who reduce their income and expenditures to get off the spiral of more work to acquire increasingly expensive stuff. Unfortunately, her book's strong academic foundation is undercut by weak conclusions. Schor's The Overworked American (LJ 1/92) covered much of the same ground, and libraries that found an audience for that title will be well served by this one. Otherwise, the subject matter, strong research, and clear writing make this an acceptable purchase for academic and larger public libraries.APatrick J. Brunet, Western Wisconsin Technical Coll. Lib., LaCrosseCopyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.


Entertainment Weekly
...a scornful indictment of consumerism ... This is the stuff from which revolutions are made.


The Wall Street Journal, Cynthia Crossen
Consumerism is a hugely complicated topic because it reflects not only individuals' beliefs, desires, tastes and jobs but also grander, if fuzzier, concepts like progress, tradition, democracy and class. Unfortunately, Ms. Schor's book has neither the intellectual rigor to master this subject nor the insight to be engaging about it.


From Kirkus Reviews
Consuming more now and enjoying it less? In this heavily researched but accessible work, Schor (Womens Studies/Harvard; The Overworked American, 1992) tells us how and why this is so and what we might do about it. ``See-want-borrow-and-buy'' is Schor's succinct summation of American spending habits. As status and identity become increasingly indistinguishable, our very sense of worth becomes invested in what we buy. We spend billions for status. Given identical pairs of jeans, identical tubes of lipstick, we will more than likely buy, at a much higher price, the item with the designer label. Yet, such spending is self-defeating and never-ending. We no longer wish simply to keep up with our neighbors, but to emulate the spending habits of the richest 20 percent of Americans (television is the main vehicle through which we know what they buy). As their consumption increases, then, so does ours. The result of this endless game of catch-up is Americans working more, going increasingly into debt, but finding themselves no more happy or contented, in fact often a great deal less so. Further, as we spend privately our support for collective consumptionon education, social services, public safetydiminishes, further eroding our sense of well-being. Its possible, but not easy given how natural it seems, to get out of this cycle of self-defeating consumption. Millions of Americans, whom Schor terms ``downshifters,'' have opted to work, earn, and consume less and in the process created richer, more meaningful lives. Schor supports all of these findings with abundant, perhaps overabundant, survey data. Missing, though, is a consideration of why consumption is so deeply ingrained in us, whats lacking in our collective lives that leads to such compensatory consumption. She discusses fears of downward mobility but never really develops this theme. Despite some shortcomings, this is an important analysis of who, or perhaps what, we are. It deserves and will surely gain a wide audience. ($100,000 ad/promo; author tour; radio satellite tour) -- Copyright ©1998, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.



"[A] masterful take on the human folly of overspending."


Los Angeles Times Book Review
"[A] masterful take on the human folly of overspending."


Publishers Weekly
"Offers trenchant commentary on Americans' overspending lifestyle and lack of savings."


Kirkus Reviews
"Consuming more now and enjoying it less? In this heavily researched but accessible work, Schor tells us how and why this is so and what we might do about it...This is an important analysis of who, or perhaps what, we are. It deserves and will surely gain a wide audience."


Philadelphia Inquirer
"Schor writes in a lively manner and offers fascinating information about consumer spending patterns. She has written an engaging book that will cause readers to look afresh not only at their society but also at themselves."


Fortune
"Engaging...[Schor'sJ case studies of families who have rejected consumerism and simplified their lifestyles are vivid and will resonate with many readers."


Entertainment Weekly
'"Thick with survey data, less taxing than a saunter through Saks, Schor's study is a scornful indictment of consumerismwhich, she argues, has created a nation of debtors but failed to fill a gaping cultural maw. This is the stuff from which revolutions are made."


Book Description
The Overspent American explores why so many of us feel materially dissatisfied, why we work staggeringly long hours and yet walk around with ever-present mental "wish lists" of things to buy or get, and why Americans save less than virtually anyone in the world. Unlike many experts, Harvard economist Juliet B. Schor does not blame consumers' lack of self-discipline. Nor does she blame advertisers. Instead she analyzes the crisis of the American consumer in a culture where spending has become the ultimate social art.


About the Author
Juliet B. Schor, bestselling author of The Overworked American and senior lecturer and Director of Studies, Women's Studies, at Harvard University, writes and lectures widely on issues of work and consumption. She lives in Newton, Massachusetts, with her husband and two children.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Juliet Schor presents original research showing how keeping up with the Joneses has evolved from keeping pace with one's neighbors and others in a similar social set to keeping up with a referent group that may include co-workers who earn five times one's own salary or television "friends" whose lifestyle is unattainable for the average person. The book also describes the growing backlash of people who are "downshifting" by working less, earning less, and finding balance by getting their lifestyles in sync with their values.

FROM THE CRITICS

Peter T. Kilborn

Schor's message and her inviting command of the language will strike a chord among many debt-laden middle-class readers. Her notion of reference-group competition, rooted in impressive polling and rigorous analysis, is an original contribution to understanding why people are so readily seduced by the temptation to buy. — New York Times Book Review

Publishers Weekly

Whereas Schor's 1992 bestseller, The Overworked American, touched a nerve among all classes of American society, her latest study is geared to middle- and upper-middle-class consumers who, in her diagnosis, are participating in a national orgy of overspending and living beyond their means. She traces this competitive, status-conscious consumption to the diverging income distribution and growing inequality beginning in the 1980s, as increasingly overworked, insecure, dissatisfied consumers, pressured by advertising and television imagery, sought to emulate the upscale lifestyle of the most affluent. An economist and director of women's studies at Harvard, Schor presents her arguable conclusion that the more TV a person watches, the more he or she is likely to spend. In counterbalance, she also reports on her nationwide survey of "downshifters," people who deliberately reduce their hours on the job in exchange for more leisure, time with family or other pursuits. In self-help fashion, she outlines nine steps individuals can take to break free of the cycle of compulsive spending. Although Schor's jeremiad lacks the impact of her earlier book, it offers trenchant commentary on Americans' overspending lifestyle and lack of savings.

Library Journal

The dual purpose of this slim volume is to describe how spending, as a process, affects the quality of life for the middle and upper classes and to show how to develop a life that puts materialism and consumerism in proper perspective. Economist Schor states that in the 1950s "keeping up with the Joneses" held sway; today, however, purchases convey status and identity with our reference groups, e.g., co-workers, media stars on television, and those with similar values, not necessarily our neighbors. Schor argues that rampant advertising and consumerism is driving an unsatisfying materialist life. She also describes "downshifters," those who reduce their income and expenditures to get off the spiral of more work to acquire increasingly expensive stuff. Unfortunately, her book's strong academic foundation is undercut by weak conclusions. Schor's The Overworked American (LJ 1/92) covered much of the same ground, and libraries that found an audience for that title will be well served by this one. -- Patrick J. Brunet, Western Wisconsin Technical Coll. Lib., LaCrosse

Booknews

Explores why so many of us feel materially dissatisfied and how "keeping up with the Jonses" has changed. The author traces America's spending problems to our class-based society and its inequalities and shows how the new consumerism hurts the public good, the environment, and the quality of life. She looks at the growing consumer backlash to escalating consumption and invites readers to examine their relationship to spending in order to break the insidious work- and-spend cycle.

Entertainment Weekly