American Necessities: Food, Clothing ... a Cell Phone?
Dec. 20, 2006 — -- The United States has the highest standard of living in the world. But for such a prosperous nation, Americans sure are a needy bunch when it comes to the products they say they can't live without.
At least that's what the Pew Research Center, a nonpartisan "fact tank," found in a recent survey that asked people to consider whether 14 popular consumer products were luxuries or necessities in their daily lives.
The survey also compared results to a similar survey taken 10 years ago, offering a glimpse into Americans' sense of entitlement to a few products that are extreme luxuries in many parts of the world.
The top two items -- the car and the washing machine -- remained virtually unchanged in surveys conducted over the last 30 years, with nine out of 10 consumers identifying them as necessities.
No product suffered a substantial drop since the last survey was conducted in 1996. But others, like the personal computer, the microwave oven and, most notably, the cell phone, made enormous gains.
"The items that jumped up the necessity scale are the everyday consumer products designed to make life more comfortable and entertaining," said Paul Taylor, executive vice president at the Pew Center.
Eric J. Johnson, a business professor at Columbia University, agreed.
"It's not like a Caribbean vacation," he said. "They're all goods you use all the time, and they're useful on a daily basis."
Take the personal computer, for instance. Seventy-three percent of adults own one, according to the survey, and more than half the respondents said they couldn't do without it, nearly double the number in 1996.
Increased digital communication and the rise of the Internet during the last decade account for much of this change. And reliance on computers is likely to grow even more in coming years as Americans go online for personal and business needs.
"We see the trend continuing as Internet information, searching, shopping, e-mail and other digital activities become more a part of mainstream Americans' lives," said Jonathan Kaye, director of consumer notebooks product marketing at Hewlett-Packard, in an e-mail interview.
