Recent Trends in Consumption

Abstract

This is the report of an attempt to learn something about the effect of the war on the pattern of consumption in Canada—that is, on the changes caused by the war in the way people spend their money. Everyone knows, of course, that we as a country have had more money to spend since the war started than we had before, and it is possible to estimate the amount of the increase with a fair degree of confidence. The question of how this increased purchasing power has been used is a great deal harder to answer because of the limited statistical evidence. Nevertheless, it is a rather important part of any evaluation of the effect of the war on the economy, and in spite of the limited basis for conclusion, well worth looking into.Most discussion about the effect of the war on consumer purchases has hinged about the so-called luxury items, and especially about automobiles. There is one school of thought which says that Canadian consumers are tending to defeat the war effort by their insistence on buying more and more of these luxury items instead of putting their money into war savings. Others, seeing somewhat the same ultimate result, place the blame on business men, and say that their pleas for “business as usual” really mean “twice as much business as usual”; these people feel that the makers and sellers of luxury items are guilty of sabotaging the war effort.