Okay, let’s talk about this idea I had rolling around in my head: trying to capture the whole “overproduction under consumption” thing with images. It wasn’t for any big project, just something I got curious about.
My Little Quest for Pictures
So, I started thinking, how do you actually show this? It sounds simple, right? Too much stuff made, not enough people buying it. But finding pictures that really nailed it? That was the tricky part.
First off, I just did a basic search online. You know, typing in things like “unsold goods,” “empty stores,” “full warehouses.” I got a lot of pictures, sure.
- Pictures of giant warehouses stacked to the roof with boxes. Okay, that shows production, lots of it.
- Pictures of empty shopping malls, deserted aisles. Yeah, that hints at under consumption.
- Photos of clearance sales, signs screaming “Everything Must Go!”
But none of them really felt like they told the whole story in one go. A full warehouse could just be efficient logistics, right? An empty mall could be because it’s Tuesday morning, or maybe people are just buying online.
Trying to Get Specific
I figured I needed to be smarter about it. I thought about the different kinds of things people buy. You’ve got your everyday stuff, the things you grab without thinking, like bread or soap. Then you got the bigger purchases, the things you shop around for, like a new TV or a car. And then there’s the fancy stuff, the specialty items.
I tried looking for images related to those specific things. Maybe pictures of car lots overflowing with last year’s models? Or clothing racks packed so tight you can’t even pull anything out? That got a bit closer. You start to see the excess more clearly.
I even briefly thought about taking pictures myself. Maybe go wander around some retail parks or industrial areas. But honestly, getting access to a really full warehouse is tough. And snapping pics inside stores can get you funny looks. Plus, like I said, a single picture rarely captures both sides of the coin – the making and the not-buying.
What I Found (or Didn’t)
It hit me that showing this imbalance is harder than it looks. It’s not just about ‘stuff’. It’s about the connection, or the disconnect, between the people making things (businesses) and the people using them (households). It’s about the flow of money and goods, and how sometimes that flow gets clogged up.
You can find images that show parts of it. You can definitely show factories churning things out. You can show stores desperate to sell. You can show waste, piles of discarded products. But getting that feeling of “too much made for the amount being bought” in a single, powerful image? That’s really tough.
In the end, I didn’t come up with some perfect visual library. I just saved a few pictures here and there that felt like they hinted at the issue. A photo of a mountain of fast fashion clothing, maybe. Or a shot of a brand new housing development sitting empty. Things that made me think about that gap.
So yeah, that was my little experiment. It was interesting, made me think more about how complex these big economic ideas are, even when you try to boil them down to a simple picture. It’s easier to talk about than to show, sometimes.
