You'd Rather Had Been Born a Cat!
Business Week has just published an article on the amount of money Americans spend with pets. According to the article (http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_32/b4045001.htm?chan=rss_topEmailedStories_ssi_5), in 2006, roughly 41 billion dollars were spent in pets, out of which approximately 2.1 billion ended up in new "living animals". Roughly 20% went to health care (the pet's, not the owner's), including vets and on-the-counter medicine.
Just picture this. 41 bi USD is (the author of the article argues) more wealth than most countries (but the 64 richest) produce in the same amoutn of time. This includes middle income economies, such as Ecuador or Bulgaria. If we consider 100 million pets in US (the magazine does not offer a number), we would get approximately 400 USD per animal, equivalent to the gdp per capita (now we are tallking about human beings) of some of the poorest African countries.
Still, the magazine argues that pets do play an important role in America's modern life, as substitutes to social relation. It might be understandable. But considering that almost 1 billion people live below the dollar-a-day poverty line (World Bank reports roughly 800 mi in 2004 living with 365 dollars a year), it is not surprising that about 1 billion humans beings would be better off as an American puppy. And that is shocking. We are starting the century paying for the dog's shrink and leaving humans starving to death.
Just picture this. 41 bi USD is (the author of the article argues) more wealth than most countries (but the 64 richest) produce in the same amoutn of time. This includes middle income economies, such as Ecuador or Bulgaria. If we consider 100 million pets in US (the magazine does not offer a number), we would get approximately 400 USD per animal, equivalent to the gdp per capita (now we are tallking about human beings) of some of the poorest African countries.
Still, the magazine argues that pets do play an important role in America's modern life, as substitutes to social relation. It might be understandable. But considering that almost 1 billion people live below the dollar-a-day poverty line (World Bank reports roughly 800 mi in 2004 living with 365 dollars a year), it is not surprising that about 1 billion humans beings would be better off as an American puppy. And that is shocking. We are starting the century paying for the dog's shrink and leaving humans starving to death.
posted by fmgoto at 1:22 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home