the back seat is a lot less comfortable than it used to be

I just read an article from Environmental Leader with the rather distressing title of "Environment Takes Back Seat To Comfort, Convenience." It summarized a survey by The Shelton Group conducted to ask 1,006 American consumers if they would give up a variety of everyday products, many of which are nearly ubiquitous in American life, if they discovered that they were damaging to the environment. These are their summarized results:



Not surprisingly, the answer to most items, which included iPods, computers, cell phones, air conditioners and dishwashers, was less than half or worse. The article proceeded to cast the results in a rather negative light.

Sure, this may come across as bad news at first, but this is America, the most pro-consumption country in the world! It's not like Japan or China issuing country-wide mandates. That's the only way to get an overwhelming response.

But looking again at the statistics, things actually look very promising. 2 out of 5 people would give up their iPod or dishwasher. Almost 1 in 4 people would give up their cell phones. These are not trivial percentages! Sure, only 7% would give up their cars, but what percent of Americans are lucky enough to live both with an adequate alternate transportation system and communities with everything close enough to rely exclusively on it? For better or worse, a car is still nearly vital to over half of Americans, because nearly half still live in rural areas and many more live dozens of miles from their workplace. And mp3 players and cell phones are also largely far from optional anymore, largely because of the rise in alternative transportation that has been seen. It could be far worse. For example, imagine asking folks in Singapore or Korea about giving up their mp3 players and cell phones and see what kind of response you get.

It appears that the American environmental movement is getting a lot of mainstream traction, and aligns with LOHAS ratios pretty well.