Conspicuously Using My Spending Power

I've read recently about economic blackouts which are due to take place in the next few months, as a protest against wealth inequalities, diversity/human rights issues and as a protest against the increasing vast wealth of large corporations the world over. This is mainly taking place in America, but anyone, anywhere can join in and refuse to spend any of their hard earned money on American or other origin products produced by large multi-billion pound corporations and more especially the ones that do not treat their employees well or with spurious diversity policies.  It has been organised to allow us the little people to demonstrate our concern about growing inequalities in wealth/human rights.

The first protest took place on 28th February and was for just one day. I joined in with this and had a no spend day on this day. I don't buy many American products, save for Coke Zero and my current brand of toothpaste, plus perhaps, the odd McDonalds. There are probably many more American owned companies I buy from or through, such as Ebay, Nestle, Proctor and Gamble, etc., so to play it safe I'll be spending with no-one on this day and this includes the multimillion pound supermarkets in this country.

Following this, I've heard that there is also a planned economic blackout on Amazon from 7th through to 14th March, mainly due to some of the treatment dished out to Amazon employees by the company. I rarely use Amazon, only as a very last resort. Mr Bezos has quite enough money already and I'm not prepared to add to his billions just for my own convenience, when I can share my money out amongst other people who I consider to be more deserving of receiving it.

I've been watching a YouTube channel lately called Gary's Economics. Gary Stevenson, who studied for his Economics degree at the London School of Economics and for his Masters at Oxford, was born into a working class East London family and subsequently ended up working in Canary Wharf as a trader. 

Having quit working for Citibank, he has subsequently launched his channel to highlight how the super rich 1% are eating up most of the financial assets in the world, leaving less and less for the average working person and in doing so creating ever widening inequalities in housing, health, wealth, etc. His videos are very interesting and he advocates for making the world a more equal place, by way of co-operation and working together to make sure that wealthy corporations pay appropriate levels of tax in order to redistribute wealth and help provide housing, health care, etc. to those that need it. He argues that our grandparents got together to do this in the past and that we can do this today, if we stick together and pressure for change.

He argues that in todays world, we are encouraged to act as individuals and only be interested in ourselves and bettering our own financial position/keeping our own heads above water, but that we need to change this and join forces with others to effect change in our societies. The alternative, is an ever widening gap in wealth with young people being unable to afford homes and unable to obtain good jobs, leading to despair, increased mental health problems and increased financial struggle and poverty. It is refreshing to hear his honest and very easy to understand explanations of todays politics of greed.

We may not think that we can do anything as individuals, but we can. We can refuse to line the pockets of large corporations and support political parties whose policies widen the gap further or solely serve the interests of the already rich. We can keep ourselves informed of what is really going on in the world and make our views known to our local/national politicians and we can use our voices to pressure for change. I for one am rethinking some of my everyday behaviours. I don't have all the answers, but I'm trying to work out what I can do to play my part going forward.