The case for cutting back.
 | By Suein Hwang Business, Economics and Technology Editor, Opinion |
Deep in the recesses of my mind, I keep a brief list of items I would consider purchasing, if only I could try them on in person: perhaps another pair of soft pants, or a new pair of eyeglasses to help compensate for the soft-pant look. Maybe even a cream blush-lipstick combo befitting my soft-pant status. Occasionally, I think about my years living in New York City, when I could dash out the door and have all manner of soft pants and soft-pant-enabling accessories at my fingertips. |
So it took some convincing for me to believe that New Yorkers, who possibly have more convenient access to shopping than people living most anywhere else, are addicted to online shopping — so much so that it is cited as a reason the city's retail sector recovery lags that of the rest of the country. |
The writer Sonja Anderson has some feelings about the fact that over 2.4 million packages are delivered in New York City every single weekday. "If those packages were people, they'd be metropolitan Austin, Texas. If they were stone blocks, they'd top the Great Pyramid of Giza. Even if each of those packages were as thin as the Postal Service's smallest priority shipping box — an inch and three-quarters thick — when stacked like books, the daily pile would be as tall as 241 Empire State Buildings, one atop the other," she writes. |
With wit and searing clarity, Anderson skewers our collective obsession with buying it now and reminds us of the collective cost of this pastime on New York's air quality, its traffic and its pedestrians. The city has led the world in areas like fashion and media. Perhaps it can help us remember the joys of rediscovering our neighborhoods as well. |
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