THE CONSUMPTION FREE

This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is set by GDPR cookie consent to record the user consent for the cookies in the category 'Functional'. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category 'Analytics'. These cookies ensure basic functionalities and security features of the website, anonymously. Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. Without consumption there would have been no exchange. Consumption thus exerts its influence on exchange also. It is the intensity of consumers’ desires which determines prices in the market. The all-pervading influence of consumption can be seen in all branches of Economics. A body of skilled workers is, therefore, built up besides successful businessmen. “Appetite comes with eating.” Besides, human faculties are exercised in the effort to satisfy human wants. The more the wants are satisfied, the more they increase. Every economic effort made to satisfy one want creates more wants. This leads to the discovery of new products and new processes and the invention of new machines. Manufacturers try to find out better and more profitable methods to satisfy the consumers. Multiplication of wants and economic progress go together. The existence of wants is the mainspring of all economic activity and then multiplying or expansion is the secret of all economic progress. A consumer has been compared to a king, and his sway extends over the entire realm of economic activity. But if the consumers happen to dislike a commodity or think that its price is too high, its production will sooner or later come to an end. If the consumers are satisfied, business prospers and production expands. Not only do the consumers give initial push to production, but their desires govern the volume and direction of all productive activity throughout. Production, thus, is directed and stimulated by consumption. It is consumption which gives the initial push to production. In other words, consumption is the beginning as well as the end of all economic activity. Consumption is regarded as the be-all and the end-all of all economic activity. Want is thus the beginning and its satisfaction the end of our economic effort. The goods have reached their final destination, e.g., wearing a shirt or eating a mango or using furniture, in which case the act of consumption is not a single process but is of a continuing nature. Consumption, thus, involves expenditure of income or wealth-using activity of man.Ĭonsumption is known as direct or final consumption, when the goods satisfy human wants directly and immediately.

THE CONSUMPTION FREE

Milk, food and other goods that we consume cannot be had free we must pay for them. For practical purposes, consumption means the spending of money income. If no want has been satisfied, it is not consumption. The emphasis is on the satisfaction of wants rather than on the destruction of utility. Consumption implies the satisfaction of a human want. If a house catches fire and is destroyed, it has not been ‘consumed’ in the economic sense. But mere destruction of utility does not mean consumption. In both cases, utility or want-satisfying power is being destroyed.

Or it may be a prolonged and slow process as in the case of furniture. The destruction of utility in consumption may be quick and immediate as in the case of a mango or a glass of milk. In other words, man has destroyed its utility in the act of eating it. Formerly, it could satisfy a human want, i.e., it possessed utility now that want-satisfying power is gone. When a man eats, a mango, he does not destroy the matter of which it is composed he has only changed its form. Matter is there in the world, it will remain there man can only change its form. Man cannot create matter nor can he destroy it. Thus consumption deals with the satisfaction of wants.Ĭonsumption has also been defined as destruction of utility: It deals with wealth-using activities of man as distinguished from wealth-getting activities, which are dealt with in Production. Whenever we make use of any commodity or service for the satisfaction of our wants, the act is called consumption. While sitting on chairs in the class-room, the students are consuming the chairs. When we take a glass of water to quench our thirst, we are said to consume water. Hence, consumption means using up of utilities. When we use a commodity, we really use its want-satisfying quality or utility.

The consumption