They should call this decade the Shrink Years, and I don’t mean the kind that makes you lie on a couch – though we all may be needing of one of those soon. Have you noticed that everything is getting smaller? Five pound bags of dog food are now 4.4 pounds. Half gallons of ice cream, which hardly exist any more, went from 64 ounces to 56 ounces to 48. Coffee, which used to come in a one pound (16-ounce) can, is now 13 ounces. So we can’t even use the words “half gallon” and “pound” to refer to our favorite products any more. It won’t be long before we can’t call a big bottle of soda a “2-liter.” Everything from a loaf of bread to crackers to the number of pages in your favorite magazine or newspaper has gotten smaller. Which means, of course, that everything is costing us more, as much as product manufacturers would have us believe otherwise. That box of Kleenex? It started out at 200 per box, and is now down to 160, or 20% less. You’re going to need to buy another box a lot sooner than you used to.
Manufacturers have all kinds of tricks to keep you from noticing these changes. One of their favorites is to change the shape of an item (especially bottles) or the way it’s packaged so you don’t notice that it got smaller. They’ll spin these changes as exciting and improved, when they’re anything but. Sometimes they introduce a product enhancement at the same time they shrink the product in an attempt to distract you. If you notice a package or feature change, be suspicious. They’ll also gradually raise the price of the (now smaller) product and then put it on “sale,” which means you’re really paying the regular price when it’s “on sale” – no, wait, you’re actually paying more, because it’s smaller. See how that works? They’ve shrunk the size and charged you more! Double play!
The few products that haven’t succumbed to this trend boast their bona fides on their labels: “Still 18 ounces!” Peanut butter manufacturers tried this for a while, but eventually caved. They’re now 16 ounces. You’d be hard-pressed to find a consumable item in your home that hasn’t been reduced in size in recent years.
Added to the fact that we now get less in just about everything we buy is the widespread incidence of declining wages. The same game of “less is more” goes on in the workplace, too, so we’re getting it on both ends. Most big companies have found clever ways to pay their people less and take away benefits they used to enjoy. Job titles are eliminated and new ones invented, forcing people to “step up” to a new position that looks an awful lot like the old one, except it involves more work for the same (or sometimes less) pay. The alternative? “Voluntarily” step down and accept a pay cut. Long term (read: high-paid) employees are given good reason to want to leave because to stay means swallowing a lot of self esteem by sticking with a company that basically abuses you. Thank you, sir, may I have another? Companies know people have few choices since they’ll face the same abuse elsewhere. What’s a self-respecting employee to do? What’s even more insulting is that companies usually spin the changes as beneficial to the employee! They figure their workforce is not only desperate, but dumb, too.
Companies also prefer new (read: younger) employees because they don’t know, like the older folks do, how much better things used to be. The newbies don’t know that they’re now being asked to do the same amount of work that used to be done by two (or more) people, so they probably won’t complain or be disgruntled. They don’t fully realize what a stressful, multi-tasking hell they’re stepping in to. To them, it’s just the way things are, and probably always have been. Does this mean they’re not as affected by it all as someone like myself, who lived through the much more prosperous and easy-going ’80s and ’90s? Yes, to some extent. The new generation pays the price without knowing it, whereas I pay it and know it. Ignorance is bliss. We both pay, but it’s so much worse to know you’re getting a raw deal. It’s hard to not feel taken advantage of, to not lose faith. We may not be living in a depression, but the past decade has felt pretty depressing to me. We’ve suffered a persistent, gradual shrinking, a taking away, one that slowly nickels and dimes you, hoping you won’t notice. But when you add it all up, much has been lost.
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So Let It Be Written 
The Shrinking Teens
Posted in Commentary, tagged Depression, economy, less is more, manufacturing, marketing, recession, retailing, wages on August 23, 2015| Leave a Comment »
They should call this decade the Shrink Years, and I don’t mean the kind that makes you lie on a couch – though we all may be needing of one of those soon. Have you noticed that everything is getting smaller? Five pound bags of dog food are now 4.4 pounds. Half gallons of ice cream, which hardly exist any more, went from 64 ounces to 56 ounces to 48. Coffee, which used to come in a one pound (16-ounce) can, is now 13 ounces. So we can’t even use the words “half gallon” and “pound” to refer to our favorite products any more. It won’t be long before we can’t call a big bottle of soda a “2-liter.” Everything from a loaf of bread to crackers to the number of pages in your favorite magazine or newspaper has gotten smaller. Which means, of course, that everything is costing us more, as much as product manufacturers would have us believe otherwise. That box of Kleenex? It started out at 200 per box, and is now down to 160, or 20% less. You’re going to need to buy another box a lot sooner than you used to.
Manufacturers have all kinds of tricks to keep you from noticing these changes. One of their favorites is to change the shape of an item (especially bottles) or the way it’s packaged so you don’t notice that it got smaller. They’ll spin these changes as exciting and improved, when they’re anything but. Sometimes they introduce a product enhancement at the same time they shrink the product in an attempt to distract you. If you notice a package or feature change, be suspicious. They’ll also gradually raise the price of the (now smaller) product and then put it on “sale,” which means you’re really paying the regular price when it’s “on sale” – no, wait, you’re actually paying more, because it’s smaller. See how that works? They’ve shrunk the size and charged you more! Double play!
The few products that haven’t succumbed to this trend boast their bona fides on their labels: “Still 18 ounces!” Peanut butter manufacturers tried this for a while, but eventually caved. They’re now 16 ounces. You’d be hard-pressed to find a consumable item in your home that hasn’t been reduced in size in recent years.
Added to the fact that we now get less in just about everything we buy is the widespread incidence of declining wages. The same game of “less is more” goes on in the workplace, too, so we’re getting it on both ends. Most big companies have found clever ways to pay their people less and take away benefits they used to enjoy. Job titles are eliminated and new ones invented, forcing people to “step up” to a new position that looks an awful lot like the old one, except it involves more work for the same (or sometimes less) pay. The alternative? “Voluntarily” step down and accept a pay cut. Long term (read: high-paid) employees are given good reason to want to leave because to stay means swallowing a lot of self esteem by sticking with a company that basically abuses you. Thank you, sir, may I have another? Companies know people have few choices since they’ll face the same abuse elsewhere. What’s a self-respecting employee to do? What’s even more insulting is that companies usually spin the changes as beneficial to the employee! They figure their workforce is not only desperate, but dumb, too.
Companies also prefer new (read: younger) employees because they don’t know, like the older folks do, how much better things used to be. The newbies don’t know that they’re now being asked to do the same amount of work that used to be done by two (or more) people, so they probably won’t complain or be disgruntled. They don’t fully realize what a stressful, multi-tasking hell they’re stepping in to. To them, it’s just the way things are, and probably always have been. Does this mean they’re not as affected by it all as someone like myself, who lived through the much more prosperous and easy-going ’80s and ’90s? Yes, to some extent. The new generation pays the price without knowing it, whereas I pay it and know it. Ignorance is bliss. We both pay, but it’s so much worse to know you’re getting a raw deal. It’s hard to not feel taken advantage of, to not lose faith. We may not be living in a depression, but the past decade has felt pretty depressing to me. We’ve suffered a persistent, gradual shrinking, a taking away, one that slowly nickels and dimes you, hoping you won’t notice. But when you add it all up, much has been lost.
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