matttproud.com (blog)

Cultural Critique: American Penny Pinching

Zürich, Schweiz

I’ve lived outside the United States for well over a decade now. It’s not my first time living abroad, but this stint is different in that it has included working and raising a family.

Being away from one’s country of birth changes a person in both expected and unexpected ways, as distance enables considerable reflection. There are a few cultural hangups I’ve developed toward the United States from afar, but I am only going to write about one: it’s the pervasive culture of penny pinching, particularly when the pinching is neither required nor neither personally nor socially beneficial. Or, put another way: the attitude that cheapest is always best. It boils down to a hypothetical interaction like this:

Me: I would like to purchase an X.

Other Person: But why not buy a Y? It’s cheaper.

Me: Y is not an X, and Y is fundamentally inferior for reasons Z and costs only marginally less.

Other Person: :emits perplexed look:

There are a lot of substitutions for X and Y above like Toyota and Kia for cars respectively, but what they specifically are doesn’t matter nor does the situation. It’s the principle that matters. And the same goes for the other party in this situation: friend, family, sales person, commentator, you-name-it.

And the reasons Z run the gamut, but chiefly:

Now, I know that the cost of the basket of needed goods and services in the U.S. has gotten more expensive over the years, and real earning power keeps falling. But this critique has been applicable longer than this recent acute real cost problem.

But when penny pinching is applied to every decision even where most parties can afford the superior choice without unnecessarily sacrificing future savings, it comes across as a morally and spiritually impoverished. And this impoverishment basically forgoes any possibility of enabling higher self- or collective-actualization. It’s neither modest, nor is it healthy.

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