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> Of course you would enjoy that when every single externality involved has conveniently been exported elsewhere and you have been handily trained over generations to accept piss-poor quality clothing as normal.

Lots of countries attribute the clothing industry to increasing standard of living and economic prosperity. Like India, Pakistan.

by filleduchaos14 minutes ago|

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Of course, do not ask the question of how they ended up with the original low standard of living to begin with, or how that increased standard of living compares to the standard of living of the westerners proud to announce that they can get the commodities they produce for cheap.

"Something something uplifted from poverty" is much shorter, quippier and cleaner.

by autoexec2 hours ago|

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Not even just piss-poor quality, much of our clothing is actually poisoning us with PFAS and microplastics.

by IncreasePosts2 hours ago|

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Anyone can make the choice to spend a similarly large amount of their income on clothing the way people did 200 years ago. In fact, it will be even higher quality than people had access to since we have much more advanced materials and techniques than existed back then. But, almost no one does that. Maybe you consider it brainwashing, but I consider it people just making a rational economic choice.

And yes, I can see a world where, if tasteless nutrient slurry was essentially free and perfect nutrition for the body, then people would gladly consume that for most meals, and maybe splurge every now and then on an "old school" meal. I don't really see a problem with that.

by bluefirebrand1 hours ago|

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> Anyone can make the choice to spend a similarly large amount of their income on clothing the way people did 200 years ago

You really can't. That price/quality point basically does not exist anymore

What's worse is that we have "designer brands" that charge the higher price point but are the exact same low quality as the lower price point stuff. Actual midrange quality just plain does not exist

by simianwords1 hours ago|

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The simple reason is that there isn't a market for it. If there were, we would see it.

by IncreasePosts1 hours ago|

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Sure it does, you just need to get something custom/bespoke/made to measure.

Take your yearly clothing expenditure and multiply it by 10. And then, just like people 200 years ago, be content with 2 to 4 compete outfits. And then stop buying clothes yearly and go more on 10+ year cycle, where you use your funds to mend clothes instead of replacing them.

Even if you only spend $300 on clothes per year, doing it the old school way means you can spend about $15,000 on 2-4 outfits and save the other $15,000 for mending and cleaning over the next 10 years.

I guarantee you you can find a high quality custom outfit for $5000.