Consumption in retirement: implications for environmental sustainability Susan Venn and Kate Burningham Centre for Environmental Strategy University of Surrey Guildford GU2 7XH www.somnia.surrey.ac.uk
Dec 05, 2014
Consumption in retirement: implications for environmental sustainability
Susan Venn and Kate Burningham
Centre for Environmental Strategy
University of Surrey
Guildford
GU2 7XH
www.somnia.surrey.ac.uk
Outline
ELiCiT project: Exploring lifestyle changes in transition
Current and competing discourses on consumption in later life – ‘baby boomers’
Explored through grocery shopping practices
Thrift/frugality
Caring roles and identities
Potential environmental implications
Conclusions
ELiCiT: Exploring lifestyle changes
in transition
‘Moments of change’ hypothesis
Explore aspects of continuity and change through lifecourse transitions
Becoming a first-time parent
Retiring
Explore expectations of changes to lifestyles
Do considerations of sustainability inform any changes
Delineate assumptions about normal and appropriate retirement (and parenting)
Sample:
80 people recruited from four locations London boroughs
Accessible rural Scotland (Fife)
Kent
Lancashire towns (Morecambe and Lancaster)
10 about to retire and 10 about to start a family in each location
Different SEG/gender
Interviews:
Three semi-structured interviews
Approximately 8 months between interviews.
Exploring recent and current lifestyle, changes that take place, and reflections on aspects of change
Methods
Final interview - reflect on what they understand by ‘a sustainable lifestyle’
Degree to which their lifestyles can be considered sustainable
What are the influences on how they live and consume
Daily journals
following each interview, 7 day reflective journal
sent to respondent prior to follow up interviews to use as discussion point
Questionnaires
following first and final interview, lifestyle and values questionnaire
Methods
The ‘Boomers’ – competing discourses
‘Boomers’ (born 1946-1964)
Cohort reaching retirement are unique
Active in a ‘cultural field’ shaped by Austerity of parents’ generation
Exposure to consumerism of 1960/70s
Increased job security and access to wealth
Agentic and active ‘third age’ characterised by increasing consumption
“Over 60s plan to ‘spend, spend, spend’ during retirement – finds
survey by McCarthy & Stone Money” April 2013
Without reference or deference to future generations
Offering a niche market (grey consumers, silver surfers)
Housing wealth
Consumer orientated, individualistic and less family orientated
Implications for the environment largely ignored
Large carbon footprint (global travel/leisure activities)
The ‘Boomers’ – current rhetoric and
competing discourses
Politically, environmentally and culturally active
Also known as the ‘Sandwich generation’
Caring - elderly relatives, children/grandchildren
Largely unpaid
Evidence for declining consumption in retirement
Changes to shopping practices
Refocusing of consumption to ‘others’
Engagement with community
Criticisms ignore heterogeneity, and create intergenerational conflict
20% under 25 and over 65 in poverty
The ‘Boomers’ – current rhetoric and
competing discourses
‘Boomers’:
Spending in retirement
Avoiding consumption
Competing discourses
Two time bombs
‘Agequake’
Climate change
Explore through grocery shopping practices
Ageing and Environmental issues rarely intersect
‘boomers’ have highest carbon footprint
Vulnerable/at risk to extreme weather conditions
Time as a resource Before retirement
Shopping more ad hoc, en route, time constrained
Following retirement
Shopping for bargains
Carefully, judiciously and thriftily
Changing practices
Shopping practices reveal enactment of Thrift = spending to save and saving to spend
Frugality = ‘careful consumption and the avoidance of waste’ (Evans 2009)
Mr Average – me – will do what’s convenient, so I do the shopping either on the way back
from golf with my list or I’ll do it on the way back from school.’ Derek
Requires skills and knowledge about shopping and cooking
Bargain hunting within shop
BOGOF, reduced goods section
Bargain hunting across shops
Potentially leading to over buying/hoarding
Enabling re-acquaintance with local shops and area
Thrift – consuming more
“I once had a cupboard full of toilet rolls because they were on a very good
offer (laughter).” Theresa
‘I’ve gone to the Co-Op, and because the Co-Op’s got a flyer, Utterly Butterly for a £1,
Heinz tomato sauce is a £1, I’ve gone in there, spent about 3 or 4 quid. Then I’ve taken
the dogs to the park on the way from the Co-Op on the way home, and then I’ve gone
off to Lidl’s and I bought sugar, bacon, because they’re on the offers, and I’ve come
back, so today I spent about £9 but I got bag loads.’ Adrian
Growing own vegetables
Batch baking and freezing (of bulk purchases)
Using everything up, avoiding waste
Recycling waste
Frugality – avoiding waste
‘we don’t waste stuff.. that’s the way we are’ Derek
Choices rooted in and explained through parental upbringing and
values
Not necessarily based on financial status
Thrift/frugality – parental values
“I think that post-war era, being post-war babies – that had a lot of
influence on our parents and how they brought us up. You know, waste
not, want not, was the main sort of phrase in our household really you
know” Sally
‘Boomers’ situate themselves
Between austerity and thrift/frugality of parents and
‘Time for me’, ‘spend’ now
Is revealed in narratives
But largely found parental values remain strongest even in
face of transitions and competing demands
Bridging identities (Leach et al)
‘Kids are terrible consumers, they think nothing of spending money like
[having] cake and coffee out’ Kenneth
‘Save energy when you can – all the time. Try not to waste food – all the
time. Got my dad’s habit there, always leave an empty plate”’ Andrew
Shopping embedded within household context and relationships
Encompasses aspects of care Shopping as act of love (Miller 1998)
Sentient activity (Mason 1996)
Caring invokes competing moral rules (Finch and Mason 1993)
Largely undertaken by women
In terms of shopping is manifest in form of ‘treating’
‘Moment’ of treat overrides desire to be thrifty
Caring roles and identities
“Morality in everyday life is constantly negotiated in relation to particular
situations, social conditions, the specific history of social relationships and
in the context of other often competing moral claims and social norms”
Caring roles and identities - treat
Influenced by changing household composition
Treating Healthier food options OR unhealthy options
Treats for other family members (returning children/grandchildren)
Also treats for self (reward)
At shops normally out of usual ‘repertoire’ , M&S, Waitrose
‘We have got a Londis, they are quite cheap. But if I really fancy something
nice to eat then I go up to Marks and Spencer’s’. (Grace)
Caring roles and identities - Gender
Changing of traditional gendered roles following retirement
Men became more engaged with shopping and cooking
To demonstrate skills of bargain awareness and prices
Treating
Depends on power balance within couples
Largely reflecting shifting domains of power within household – reasserting ‘work role’ since giving up working
‘I suppose to a degree we’re saving a little bit because I'm getting bargains,
but then I see something that I think “oh [wife] would like that”, so I buy that
which I wouldn’t normally do or we wouldn’t normally have done.’ Jerry
Difficult to assess influence of thrift/frugality/caring in sustainability terms Saving money to continue spending on global travel
Saving money to pass to children (generativity)
Bargain shopping over and above needs - hoarding
More time means longer distances travelled to find a bargain
Shopping less overall, reduced meat consumption
Shopping less overall at local shops
Buying from local shops
(Re)engagement with home baking and cooking (but includes unusual and non-seasonal produce)
Contradictions and environmental
implications
Multiple cascading transitions
Moving home
Fluctuating retirement status
Changing relationships
Partners
Broader family and friendship relations
Health issues
Seasonality of interviews
Recession
All of which potentially ‘disrupt’ and influence everyday practices
Shopping and cooking practices (mostly) change through transition to retirement
Narratives reveal tensions between parental upbringing and aspirations to spend/travel , but practices largely reflect upbringing
Shopping takes place within a household context where caring responsibilities significantly influence consumption choices
Changes have both positive and negative environmental implications
Changes also influenced by multiple transitions
Questions single ‘moments of change’ hypothesis
Retirement itself is a fluid and long lasting transition
Given that, sustainability of any positive changes are unclear….
Conclusions
Acknowledgements
This research is supported by :
Defra (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Scottish Government
The ESRC (Economics and Social Research Council)
July 2010 - August 2013