> Three-quarters of all people in extreme poverty live in Sub-Saharan Africa or in fragile and conflict-affected countries.

The people in extreme poverty are not the people you are making the argument for. Changing your consumption isn't going to do a thing for sub Saharan Africa and latin America, as a matter of fact increasing consumption of goods from those countries will improve their quality of life.

If you are ever in South Africa contact me, really. I'll take you to those people in povery, tell them yourself how you think Americans spending less money is going to change their lives in any way.

You will probably find some peoplewho are just trying their best to make it through the day. You will also find a lot of their lack of wealth comes from a lack of education.

You want to make a lasting difference, stop donating to feel good charities or animals or nonsense. Find an organisation that is focussed on improving education in these areas and donate to that.

Because nothing kills corrupt governments quite like an educated voting base.

"see, rampant consumerism is good for the people in sub-saharan africa! it's okay to buy disposable land-fill!"

another way to look at this is, we export our pollution to another country until their citizens get tired of the pollution, and thus charge more for production. So we pull up stakes and move on to the next country that's too poor to complain.

But i guess bootstrapping economies by dumping toxins everywhere on the planet is ok.

The goal should be to bootstrap sustainable, clean technologies, not the same 1800s era industrialization that coats the land in a fine sheen of toxic waste.