It doesn’t matter that most of the lifestyles portrayed online are unattainable (and often staged), we still get jealous of the wealth and fame that influencers display.
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Americans’ credit card debt soared to a shocking $1.13 trillion by the end of last year. Most of that debt can be attributed to rising interest rates and the higher cost of living in general, but an estimated 7% of Americans are compulsive shoppers, racking up significant credit card debt from hundreds of non-essential purchases.
The temptations to buy are endless. Spend five minutes scrolling through influencer content on social media and you’ll come across a range of expensive products being marketed to you in the form of subscription boxes, skincare products, fitness equipment and just about anything else you can think of.
From everyday ads to shopping haul videos to the popular “what I spend in a day” motif, influencers are pushing purchase after purchase on their viewers. It’s no surprise that purchases of personal care products and clothing are on the rise, with the majority of that spending considered non-essential. Americans are overspending, falling victim to overconsumption, and perpetuating a cycle of waste.
Social media shamelessly promotes materialism. Advertising is everywhere on social platforms—not just when influencers praise the brands that sponsor them, but also in every strategically placed piece aimed at the camera, brand name outward.
Lifestyle influencers often focus on strategies for happiness and well-being, showing an idyllic life that involves little more than a daily workout in expensive clothes and aesthetically pleasing meals. The message is that money can buy love – and happiness. You just have to spend everything to have it all.
A college degree is still important: Young conservatives like me are told not to go to college. That is shortsighted.
Influencers create a false sense of reality
Of course, we know these lifestyles aren’t realistic, but it’s all too easy to believe that influencers’ routines are an honest, accurate representation of the creators’ daily lives.
What many consumers – myself included – often fail to realize is that social media is a business. A study by Later found that 94% of influencers make money through brand partnerships – when a brand pays the influencer to sell their product to their viewers.
Many influencers make a large portion of their profits through Amazon Storefronts, where they link to products they display and encourage viewers to shop there. It’s questionable whether the content creators actually like or even use the products.
Influencers capitalize on the compulsive buying habits of their viewers and equate their seemingly perfect lives with the amount of stuff they own. Lifestyle influencers love to show off their thousands of beauty products, dozens of Amazon packages on their doorstep, and color-coded, fully stocked refrigerators as the secrets to a romantic life. Their content is based on the idea that their happiness, or at least the illusion of happiness, is found in stuff. Want to be as organized and put together as I am? Shop these products via the link in my bio!
It doesn’t matter that most of the lifestyles portrayed online are unattainable (and often staged), we still get jealous of the wealth and fame that influencers display.
Content creators continue to push us to buy more, more, more, and a recent study found that social media use is correlated with materialism, which drives the desire for more and more possessions. Yet, contrary to popular belief, owning more “stuff” has been shown to be detrimental to overall life satisfaction.
No Instagram, no TikTok: I wasn’t allowed to have a smartphone until I was 16. I can’t thank my parents enough.
This overconsumption of products promoted on social media is not only harmful to your wallet, but also to the environment.
The lifestyle that internet personalities promote is incredibly wasteful. Every video about stocking the fridge or pantry shows dozens of disposable plastic items neatly arranged in organized acrylic bins—individually wrapped snacks, plastic bottles of water, soft drinks in aluminum cans. This amount of waste is unjust, especially since it’s more about aesthetics than practicality.
Influencers promote fast fashion that is harmful to the environment
Worse still, social media has contributed to the rise of fast fashion: cheap, mass-produced clothing that focuses more on trend than quality. This results in staggering amounts of textile waste and water pollution from dyes, as global clothing consumption has increased by 400% in the past 20 years.
Then there are the allegations of labor law violations and theft of personal information by major fast fashion retailers like Shein and Temu.
The main goal of influencers is to make money, not to help their viewers make smart purchases.
Most of us don’t get paid to have a 17-step skincare routine. Influencers do. Their job is glorified advertising. And guess what? You don’t need most, if not all, of the products they claim you need.
We need to think about where and why we spend our money. If it’s a 45 second video of people filming themselves getting out of bed in the morning, maybe put your wallet away.
You will probably be happier, and so will the Earth.
Christine Schückler is a USA TODAY Opinion intern and a rising junior at the University of Virginia, where she studies English and French. At UVA, she writes for The Jefferson Independent and performs with the UVA University Singers.
