Behavioural economics finds it's significance from the way it reframes the economic perspective of human beings. We are no longer simply called homo economicus. We are allowed to selfless, confused and cooperative.
But that is not entirely satisfactory. The economic paradigm is still in place. We are still primarily consumers. We exist to consume, and consume to exist. We may occasionally give some of our consumption to others, but our primary purpose is unchanged.
There are, as I see it, two main drivers of this consumption complex. Our philosophical leaders (economists and their mindless followers; politicians) who tell us that consumption is everything. And us, who seemingly have an innate drive to get more stuff. More stuff than we had yesterday, more stuff than our neighbours have today.
The problem is that consumption isn't everything. We are more complex than that. Happiness is not just a function of consumption (c.f. friends, family). We cannot be reduced to one-dimensional, consuming robots.
And if that were not enough to make us think twice, limitless consumption is not actually achievable. Our environment has limits. The planet has limits. There are only so many fish in the sea. As Stewart Wallis (of the think tank the new economics foundation) recently said in a TED talk, we need to move on from seeing ourselves as consumers to stewards. Based purely on pragmatism, a serious change in our self-image is needed.
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