Consumption or Leisure

There really isn't a question that we work more today than we did 30 or 50 years ago. Heck the average farmer in the 1300s worked around 1500 hours a year to get food on the table, and today we work more than double that amount to scrape by1. I suppose the question is why we work so much more now. We work more now, in large part, because we continually choose consumption of goods over leisure2. That raise could either buy you someone to do some stuff around the house that you don't want to do, or a newer nicer car. We often choose the car instead of the freedom. We choose to work more to earn more to purchase stuff we're mostly not going to use. I'm as guilty of it as anyone. Some cool sneakers go on sale and I purchase a pair or two. New bike tech comes out and I upgrade something on my bike. Any tips on how to choose leisure instead of more stuff? How have you curbed your spending so that you can invest in more time for things you like to do? Footnotes 1 Utopia for Realists Pg 129 2…