THE STORY OF STUFF

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THE STORY OF STUFF Page 42

by Annie Leonard


  2. Interview with Dara O’Rourke, April 2009.

  3. Ibid.

  4. Ibid.

  5. Robert Goldman and Stephen Papson, Nike Culture: the Sign of the Swoosh (London: Sage Publications Ltd., 1999), p. 168.

  6. Interview with Dara O’Rourke, April 2009.

  7. Ibid.

  8. Ibid.

  9. William Greider, “A New Giant Sucking Sound,” The Nation, December 31, 2001 (thenation.com/doc/20011231/greider).

  10. David C. Korten, When Corporations Rule the World, 2nd ed. (San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2001), p. 216.

  11. Interview with Dara O’Rourke, April 2009.

  12. Gary Fields, Territories of Profit: Communications, Capitalist Development and the Innovative Enterprises of G. F. Swift and Dell Computer (Palo Alto, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2004), p. 208.

  13. Interview with Dara O’Rourke, April 2009.

  14. Personal communication with Patrick Bond, professor at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, August 2009.

  15. Interview with Dara O’Rourke, April 2009.

  16. Ibid.

  17. Correspondence with Dara O’Rourke, September 2009.

  18. Interview with Dara O’Rourke, April 2009.

  19. Ibid.

  20. Personal correspondence with Michael Maniates, March 2009.

  21. America’s Freight Challenge, a report by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) for the National Surface Transportation Policy and Revenue Study Commission, May 2007, p. 25.

  22. Ibid.

  23. Wayne Ellwood, The No-Nonsense Guide to Globalization (London: Verso, 2005), p. 18.

  24. “Ship Sulfur Emissions Found to Strongly Impact Worldwide Ocean and Coastal Pollution,” Science Daily, August 20, 1999, based on research from Carnegie Mellon and Duke universities.

  25. Rochester Institute of Technology, “Pollution from Marine Vessels Linked to Heart and Lung Disease,” FirstScience News, November 7, 2007 (firstscience.com/home/news/breaking-news-all-topics/pollution-from-marine-vessels-linked-to-heart-and-lung-disease_39078.html).

  26. “Commercial Ships Spew Half as Much Particulate Pollution as World’s Cars,” NASA Earth Observatory, February 26, 2009 (earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Newsroom/view.php?id=37290).

  27. “Large Cargo Ships Emit Double Amount of Soot Previously Estimated,” Science Daily, July 11, 2008 (sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/07

  /080709103848.htm).

  28. John W. Miller, “The Mega Containers Invade,” The Wall Street Journal, January 26, 2009 (online.wsj.com/article/SB123292489602813689.html).

  29. America’s Freight Challenge, p. 13.

  30. Freight and Intermodal Connectivity in China, a report sponsored by the U.S. Department of Transportation, Federal Highway Administration, May 2008, pp. 19–23 (international.fhwa.dot.gov/pubs/pl08020/pl08020.pdf).

  31. Ibid., p. 23.

  32. Ibid., p. 31.

  33. America’s Freight Challenge, pp. 18–19.

  34. Ibid., p. 19.

  35. Ibid.

  36. “Quantification of the Health Impacts and Economic Valuation of Air Pollution from Ports and Goods Movement in California,” California Air Resources Board, April 20, 2006 (arb.ca.gov/planning/gmerp/gmerp.htm).

  37. David Bensman and Yael Bromberg, “Deregulation has wrecked port trucking system,” The Record/NorthJersey.com, March 29, 2009.

  38. David R. Butcher, “The State of U.S. Rail, Air and Sea Shipping,” ThomasNet News, February 3, 2009 (news.thomasnet.com/IMT/archives/2009/02/shipping-carrier-container-trends-challenges-in-us-state-of-industry.html).

  39. Helen Lindblom and Christian Stenqvist, “SKF Freight Transports and CO2 Emissions: A study in environmental management accounting,” master’s thesis, Department of Energy and Environment, Chalmers University of Technology, 2007 (chalmers.se/ee/SV/forskning/forskargrupper/

  miljosystemanalys/publikationer/pdf-filer

  /2007_2/downloadFile/attachedFile_3_f0/2007–18.pdf).

  40. “SmartWay,” U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (epa.gov/smartway/basic-infor mation/index.htm).

  41. Justin Thomas, “UPS Unveils ‘World’s Most Efficient Delivery Vehicle,’” TreeHugger, August 10, 2006 (treehugger.com/files/2006/08/ups_unveils_wor_1.php).

  42. Michael Graham Richard, “FedEx Converts 92 Delivery Trucks to Diesel Hybrids with Lithium-Ion Batteries,” TreeHugger, July 21, 2009 (treehugger.com/files/2009/07/fedex-converts-92-delivery-trucks-to-diesel-electric-hybrids.php).

  43. Andrew Posner, “DHL Unveils Guilt-free Shipping,” TreeHugger, March 9, 2008 (treehugger.com/files/2008/03/dhl-guiltfree-shipping.php).

  44. Mark Bernstein, “Driving the Integrated Global Supply Chain from the Top,” World Trade 100, September 1, 2005 (worldtrademag.com/Articles/Feature_Article/

  5a7707fc6aaf7010VgnVCM100000f932a8c0).

  45. Sarah Raper Larenaudie, “Inside the H&M Fashion Machine,” Time, February 9, 2004 (time.com/time/magazine/article/

  0,9171,993352,00.html).

  46. Ola Kinnander, “H&M Profit Falls 12% as Currencies Aggravate Weak Sales,” The Wall Street Journal, March 26, 2009 (online.wsj.com/article/SB123807961431048401.html).

  47. Larenaudie, “Inside the H&M Fashion Machine.”

  48. Susanne Göransson, Angelica Jönsson, and Michaela Persson, “Extreme Business Models in the Clothing Industry: A case study of H&M and ZARA,” dissertation, Department of Business Studies, Kristianstad University, December 2007, pp. 50–52.

  49. Interview with Dara O’Rourke, April 2009.

  50. Göransson, Jönsson, and Persson, “Extreme Business Models,” p. 55.

  51. Interview with Dara O’Rourke, April 2009.

  52. Larenaudie, “Inside the H&M Fashion Machine.”

  53. Keisha Lamothe, “Online retail spending surges in 2006,” CNNMoney.com, January 4, 2007 (money.cnn.com/2007/01/04/news/economy/

  online_sales/?postversion=2007010410).

  54. Stacy Mitchell, Big-Box Swindle: The True Cost of Mega-Retailers and the Fight for America’s Independent Businesses (Boston: Beacon Press, 2007), p. 12.

  55. Speech by Jeff Bezos at MIT, November 25, 2002 (mitworld.mit.edu/video/1/).

  56. Ibid.

  57. Renee Wilmeth of Google Books and Literary Architects, quoted by Dave Taylor, Ask Dave Taylor (askdavetaylor.com/what_percentage_of_books

  _printed_end_up _destroyed.html).

  58. H. Scott Matthews and Chris T. Hendricks, “Economic and Environmental Implications of Online Retailing in the United States,” dissertation, Graduate School of Industrial Administration, Carnegie Mellon University, August 2001.

  59. “By 2010, more than 50 percent of books sold worldwide will be printed on demand at the point of sale in the form of library-quality paperbacks,” predicts Jason Epstein, the former editorial director of Random House and author of Book Business: Publishing—Past, Present, and Future, quoted by Wired magazine, May 2002 (wired.com/wired/archive/10.05/longbets.html?pg=4).

  60. Collin Dunn, “Online Shopping vs. Driving to the Mall: The Greener Way to Buy,” TreeHugger, February 13, 2009 (treehugger.com/files/2009/02/online-shopping-vs-driving-mall-greener.php).

  61. Freecycle website: freecycle.org.

  62. Mitchell, Big-Box Swindle, p. 13.

  63. Ibid.

  64. “Wal-Mart awarding $2B to U.S. hourly employees, report says,” Reuters, March 21, 2009 (usatoday.com/money/industries/retail/2009–03–19-walmart-workers_N.htm).

  65. Mitchell, Big-Box Swindle, p. 13.

  66. Ibid., p. 12.

  67. Ibid., p. 15.

  68. Ibid.

  69. Ibid., p. 13.

  70. Ibid., p. 14.

  71. Sonia Reyes, “Study: Wal-Mart Private Brands Are Catching On,” Brandweek, August 21, 2006 (brandweek.com/bw/esearch/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003019846).

  72. Mitchell, Big-Box Swindle, p. 7.

  73. “Where to buy appliances: Big stores aren’t n
ecessarily the best,” Consumer Reports, September 1, 2005.

  74. Mitchell, Big-Box Swindle, p. xvii.

  75. “The Real Facts About Wal-Mart,” WakeUpWalMart.com (wakeupwalmart.com/facts/).

  76. Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price, Robert Greenwald, director, 2005.

  77. “The Real Facts About Wal-Mart,” citing data from the UFCW analysis of Wal-Mart’s health plan, WakeUpWalMart.com, March 2008 (wakeupwalmart.com/facts/).

  78. “Disclosures of Employers Whose Workers and Their Dependents Are Using State Health Insurance Programs,” Good Jobs First, updated October 26, 2009 (goodjobsfirst.org/corporate_subsidy/hidden_

  taxpayer_costs.cfm).

  79. “How Wal-Mart Has Used Public Money in Your State,” Wal-Mart Subsidy Watch (walmartsubsidywatch.org).

  80. Mitchell, Big-Box Swindle, p. xv.

  81. Al Norman, “Barstow, CA., Lawsuit Freezes Wal-Mart Distribution Center Until May,” Wal-Mart Watch, January 12, 2009 (walmartwatch.com/battlemart/archives/

  barstow_ca_lawsuit_freezes_wal_mart

  _distribution_center_until_may/).

  82. Mike Troy, “High-tech DC streamlines supply chain,” DSN Retailing Today, May 9, 2005 (findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_mOFNP/is_9

  _44/13734506/ai_n).

  83. Norman, “Barstow, CA., Lawsuit Freezes Wal-Mart Distribution Center Until May.”

  84. Bensman and Bromberg, “Deregulation has wrecked port trucking system.”

  85. Ibid.

  86. Stephanie Rosenbloom and Michael Barbaro, “Green-Light Specials, Now at Wal-Mart,” The New York Times, January 24, 2009 (nytimes.com/2009/01/25/business/25walmart.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1). Also see the fact sheets that Wal-Mart regularly up-dates on their company website (walmartstores.com/FactsNews/FactSheets

  /#Sustainability).

  87. “Zero Waste,” Wal-Mart (walmartstores.com/Sustainability/7762.aspx).

  88. Mitchell, Big-Box Swindle, pp. 3–4.

  89. Ibid., pp. 5–6.

  90. Ibid.

  91. Ibid.

  92. Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price.

  93. Mitchell, Big-Box Swindle, p. 40.

  94. “The Real Facts About Wal-Mart,” WakeUpWalMart (wakeupwalmart.com/facts/), based on data from the U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics (bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t16.htm).

  95. “The Real Facts About Wal-Mart,” quoting directly from Wal-Mart’s “A Manager’s Toolbox to Remaining Union Free,” pp. 20–21.

  96. Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price.

  97. Ross Perot with Pat Choate, Save Your Job, Save Our Country (New York: Hyperion Books, 1993), p. 41.

  98. Thomas Friedman, “Mexico feels job-loss pain,” Arizona Daily Star, April 3, 2004 (azstarnet.com/sn/related/16486).

  99. Mitchell, Big-Box Swindle, p. xv.

  100. Uri Berliner, “Haves and Have-Nots: Income Inequality in America,” National Public Radio, February 5, 2007 (npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=7180618).

  101. John M. Broder, “California Voters Reject Wal-Mart Initiative,” The New York Times, April 7, 2004 (nytimes.com/2004/04/07/national/07CND-WALM.html).

  102. Ellwood, The No-Nonsense Guide to Globalization, pp. 24–27.

  103. Ibid.

  104. Ibid., pp. 27–34.

  105. “World Bank energy complex creates hell on earth for Indian citizens,” Probe International, March 1, 1998 (probeinternational.org/export-credit/world-bank-energy-complex-creates-hell-earth-indian-citizens).

  106. “About Us,” The World Bank (web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/

  EXTABOUTUS/0,,contentMDK:20040565~menuPK:

  1696892~pagePK:51123644~piPK:329829~

  theSitePK:29708,00.html).

  107. Amitayu Sen Gupta, “Debt elief for LDCs: The new Trojan Horse of Neo-Liberalism,” International Development Economics Associates (networkideas.org/news/aug2006/Debt_Relief.pdf).

  108. “Status of Kenya’s Debt,” fact sheet, Jubilee USA (jubileeusa.org/fileadmin/user_upload/

  Resources/Kenya_2005.pdf), citing Njoki Githethwa, “Government of Kenya should declare official position on debt,” press release from the Kenya Debt Relief Network, July 19, 2005 (odiousdebts.org/odiousdebts/index.cfm?DSP=content&ContentID=13408).

  109. “How Big is the Debt of Poor Countries?” Jubilee Debt Campaign (jubileedebtcampaign.org.uk/2 How big is the debt of poor countries%3F+2647.twl).

  110. Ibid.

  111. “World Bank/IMF Questions and Answers,” Global Exchange (globalexchange.org/campaigns/wbimf/faq.html). See also 50 Years Is Enough, a campaign of the U.S. Network for Global Economic Justice (50years.org/issues/).

  112. “H.R. 2634: Jubilee Act for Responsible Lending and Expanded Debt Cancellation of 2008,” Open Congress (opencongress.org/bill/110-h2634/actions_votes).

  113. “Clinton pledges more than $50m in aid for Haiti,” Agence France-Presse, April 14, 2009 (google.com/hostednews/afp/article/

  ALeqM5i0vtqlmpiKI-5VkFrRKXqINsYsJw).

  114. “Top Reasons to Oppose the WTO,” Global Exchange (globalexchange.org/campaigns/wto/OpposeWTO.html). See also Ellwood, The No-Nonsense Guide to Globalization, p. 34.

  115. Ellwood, The No-Nonsense Guide to Globalization, pp. 36–37.

  116. Amory Starr, Global Revolt: A guide to the movements against globalization (London: Zed Books, 2005), p. 30.

  117. For images of the 1999 Battle of Seattle, see youtube.com/watch?v=_JXPIBsxdk$; youtube.com/watch?v=YdACqgxRLsQ; video.google.com/videosearch?q=News+WTO+Seattle+1999&hl=en&client=firefox-a&emb=0&aq=f#.

  118. “A Million Farmers Protest Against the WTO in India,” Karnataka State Farmers’ Association, March 21, 2001 (organicconsumers.org/corp/wtoindia.cfm).

  119. “Memorandum submitted to the Prime Minister: Keep Agriculture Out of WTO,” Members of the Indian Coordination Committee of Farmers Movements, October 2, 2005 (focusweb.org/india/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=744&Itemid=30).

  120. “Suicide and protests mar summit,” BBC News, September 11, 2003 (news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/3098916.stm).

  121. “South Korea Activist Kills Himself, Others Injured in Cancun Protest,” Agence France-Presse, September 11, 2003 (commondreams.org/headlines03/0911–06.htm).

  122. “TRADE Act Fact Sheet 2009,” Public Citizen (citizen.org/trade/tradeact/).

  123. Personal correspondence with Kevin Gallagher, August 2009.

  124. “This is USAID,” USAID (usaid.gov/about_usaid/).

  125. Marc Lacey, “Across Globe, Empty Bellies Bring Rising Anger,” The New York Times, April 18, 2008 (nytimes.com/2008/04/18/world/americas/18food.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1).

  126. Oscar Olivera and Tom Lewi, Cochabamba!: Water War in Bolivia (Boston: South End Press, 2004).

  127. “100 Mile Diet: An interview with James and Alisa” (100milediet.org/faqs). Find out more in their book: Alisa Smith and J. B. MacKinnon, Plenty: Eating Locally on the 100 Mile Diet (New York: Three Rivers Press, 2007).

  128. Bill McKibben, Deep Economy (New York: Times Books, 2007), p. 128.

  129. David Kupfer, “Table for Six Billion, Please: Judy Wicks on her plan to change the world, one restaurant at a time,” The Sun Magazine, iss. 392, August 2008 (thesunmagazine.org/issues/392/table_for_six_billion).

  130. Ibid.

  131. Rob Hopkins and Peter Lipman, Who We Are and What We Do, Transition Network, February 1, 2009 (transitionculture.org/wp-content/uploads/who_we_are_high.pdf).

  132. Anderson, Cavanagh, and Lee, Field Guide to the Global Economy, p. 52.

  133. Barbara Ehrenreich, foreword to Anderson, Cavanagh, and Lee, Field Guide to the Global Economy, p. viii.

  Chapter 4: Consumption

  1. Robert D. McFadden and Angela Macropoulos, “WalMart Employee Trampled to Death,” The New York Times, November 28, 2008 (nytimes.com/2008/11/29/business/29walmart.html).

  2. Ken Belson and Karen Zraick, “Mourning a Good Friend and Trying to Make Sense of a Stampede,” The New York Times, November
29, 2008 (nytimes.com/2008/11/30/nyregion/30walmart.html).

  3. Christian Sylt, “Christopher Rodrigues: Visa is far more than just a card, says its Cambridge Blue boss,” The Independent [UK], November 6, 2005 (independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/christopher-rodrigues-visa-is-far-more-than-just-a-card -says-its-cambridge-blue-boss-514061.html).

  4. Worldwatch Institute, State of the World 2004: Special Focus—Consumer Society (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2004), p. 5.

  5. John De Graaf, David Wann, and Thomas H. Naylor, Affluenza: The All-Consuming Epidemic, 2nd ed. (San Francico: Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc., 2005), p. 13.

  6. Worldwatch Institute, State of the World 2004, p. 10.

  7. Benjamin Barber, Consumed: How Markets Corrupt Children, Infantilize Adults, and Swallow Citizens Whole (New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 2008), p. 8.

  8. Paul Lomartire, “The Monster That Is the Mall of America,” Chicago Tribune, May 11, 2003 (chicagotribune.com/travel/midwest/minnesota/

  chi-071219twincities-monstermall,0,1792859.story).

  9. Mellody Hobson, “Mellody’s Math: Credit Card Cleanup,” ABC News, February 28, 2009 (abcnews.go.com/GMA/FinancialSecurity/story?id=126244&page=1).

  10. De Graaf, Wann, and Naylor, Affluenza, p. 41.

  11. Worldwatch Institute, State of the World 2004, p. 4.

  12. Margot Adler, “Behind the Ever-Expanding American Dream House,” National Public Radio, July 4, 2006 (npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5525283).

  13. Juliet Schor, “Cleaning the Closet,” essay in Duane Elgin’s The Voluntary Simplicity Discussion Course (Portland: Northwest Earth Institute, 2008), p. 35.

  14. Michelle Hofmann, “The s-t-r-e-t-c-h Garage,” Los Angeles Times, October 1, 2006 (articles.latimes.com/2006/oct/01/realestate/re-garages1).

  15. SSA Industry Report and SSA Update for 2009, Self Storage Association (selfstorage.org/SSA/Home/AM/ContentManager

  Net/ContentDisplay.aspx?Section

  =Home&ContentID=4163).

  16. See the transcript of Bush’s speech in Atlanta on November 8, 2001; the quote is “People are going about their daily lives, working and shopping and playing, worshipping at churches and synagogues and mosques, going to movies and to baseball games. Life in America is going forward, and as the fourth grader who wrote me knew, that is the ultimate repudiation of terrorism.” (archives.cnn.com/2001/US/11/08/

 

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