84+ Best Consumption Quotes: Exclusive Selection

Inspirational consumption quotes will encourage you to think a little deeper than you usually would and broaden your perspective.

Most Famous Consumption Quotes

Think not so much of what you lack as of what you have. Marcus Aurelius

Infinite growth of material consumption in a finite world is an impossibility. E. F. Schumacher

It is not the man who has little, but he who desires more, that is poor. Peter Rosegger

The world has also learned that economic growth, by itself, cannot close the gap between rich and poor. Dalai Lama

To truly cherish the things that are important to you, you must first discard those that have outlived their purpose. To throw away what you no longer need is neither wasteful nor shameful. Marie Kondō

Consumption is the sole end and purpose of all production. Adam Smith

If each individual stops accumulating possessions, then all will have enough. Francis of Assisi

Consumption may be regarded as negative production. Alfred Marshall

Rich is he who has much, richer is he who needs little, richest is he who gives much. Gerhard Tersteegen

The model of ownership, in a society organized round mass consumption, is addiction. Christopher Lasch

Those who place a great value on gardens, buildings, clothes, jewelry, or any possession are less sociable and pleasing; they lose sight of the people. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Conspicuous consumption of valuable goods is a means of reputability to the gentleman of leisure. Thorstein Veblen

It is not the man who has too little, but the man who craves more, that is poor. Seneca

Poetry and consumption are the most flattering of diseases. William Shenstone

In a materialistic society, being poor but happy is a political statement. Mokokoma Mokhonoana

A society in which consumption has to be artificially stimulated in order to keep production going is a society founded on trash and waste, for such a society is a house built upon sand. Dorothy L. Sayers

Serenity is gained by letting go without hating. Gerhard Uhlenbruck

Too many of us now tend to worship self indulgence and consumption. Jimmy Carter

You are not sovereign if you have a lot, but need little. Nico Paech

We are prone to judge success by the index of our salaries or the size of our automobiles rather than by the quality of our service and relationship to mankind. Martin Luther King

I claim that in losing the spinning wheel we lost our left lung. We are, therefore, suffering from galloping consumption. The restoration of the wheel arrests the progress of the fell disease. Mahatma Gandhi

If property had simply pleasures, we could stand it; but its duties make it unbearable. Oscar Wilde

Sane and intelligent human beings are like all other human beings, and carefully and cautiously and diligently conceal their private real opinions from the world and give out fictitious ones in their stead for general consumption. Mark Twain

Life is too short to be little. Dale Carnegie

A shift is necessary toward lifestyles less geared to environmental damaging consumption patterns. Maurice Strong

There is only one way to feel good One must learn to be content with what is given and not always demand what is lacking. Theodor Fontane

Most of the movies I saw growing up were viewed as totally disposable, fine for quick consumption, but they have survived 50 years and are still growing. Manuel Puig

Simplicity is the key note of all true elegance. Coco Chanel

Daily life is governed by an economic system in which the production and consumption of insults tends to balance out. Raoul Vaneigem

How many things there are that I don’t need. Socrates

I believe that the average guy in the street will give up a great deal, if he really understands the cost of not giving it up. In fact, we may find that, while we’re drastically cutting our energy consumption, we’re actually raising our standard of living. David R. Brower

Whenever we buy something we do not need, we waste not only money but also time. Mokokoma Mokhonoana

The Texas Energy Office’s Loan Star Program has reduced building energy consumption and taxpayers energy costs through the efficient operation of public buildings, saving taxpayers more than $172 million through energy efficiency projects. Rosa DeLauro

After consumption vouchers, there can actually only be ration cards, care packages and raisin bombers. Guido Westerwelle

If most American cities are about the consumption of culture, Los Angeles and New York are about the production of culture not only national culture but global culture. Barbara Kruger

Every man is looking for a hold. But the only hold lies in letting go. Hape Kerkeling

By the immediate preservation of eggs for home consumption through the use of water glass or lime water, larger supplies of fresh eggs may be made available for marketing later in the season, when production is less and prices higher. David F. Houston

He is not a free man who cannot indulge in idleness once in a while. Cicero

And almost half of American oil consumption is for motor vehicles. Tim Holden

Consumption is the sole end and purpose of all production; and the interest of the producer ought to be attended to only so far as it may be necessary for promoting that of the consumer. Adam Smith

Finally, we should help developing nations like China and India curb their exponentially increasing consumption of oil and natural gas, which is driving world prices higher. Bobby Jindal

Simplicity is the result of maturity. Friedrich Schiller

Multinational corporations do control. They control the politicians. They control the media. They control the pattern of consumption, entertainment, thinking. They’re destroying the planet and laying the foundation for violent outbursts and racial division. Jerry Brown

If you live for having it all, what you have is never enough. Vicki Robin

Books constitute capital. A library book lasts as long as a house, for hundreds of years. It is not, then, an article of mere consumption but fairly of capital, and often in the case of professional men, setting out in life, it is their only capital. Thomas Jefferson

Less is more. Robert Browning

The basis on which good repute in any highly organized industrial community ultimately rests is pecuniary strength; and the means of showing pecuniary strength, and so of gaining or retaining a good name, are leisure and a conspicuous consumption of goods. Thorstein Veblen

We don’t buy what we want to have. We consume what we want to be. John Hegarty

Tourism, human circulation considered as consumption is fundamentally nothing more than the leisure of going to see what has become banal. Guy Debord

Capitalism has an inherent vice the unequal distribution of goods. Socialism, on the other hand, has an inherent virtue the equal distribution of misery. Winston Churchill

All I know about thermal pollution is that if we continue our present rate of growth in electrical energy consumption it will simply take, by the year 2000, all our freshwater streams to cool the generators and reactors. David R. Brower

Thrift is good revenue. Cicero

With production alone as the goal, industry in North America was dominated by the assembly line, standardization for mass consumption. Arthur Erickson

We underestimate what we have and overestimate what we are. Marie von Ebner Eschenbach

The level of potential physical productivity of a society depends on both the development of the intellect of its members, and a minimal standard of both demographic characteristics and of consumption. Robert Trout

Man will never find outside what he does not have inside. Alexandra Herdth

There is held to be no surer test of civilization than the increase per head of the consumption of alcohol and tobacco. Yet alcohol and tobacco are recognizable poisons, so that their consumption has only to be carried far enough to destroy civilization altogether. Havelock Ellis

When you buy something, you are not paying for it with money. You’re paying with the hours of life you had to spend earning that money. The difference is that life is one thing money can’t buy. Jose Mujica

Home computers are being called upon to perform many new functions, including the consumption of homework formerly eaten by the dog. Doug Larson

A man is rich in proportion to the number of things which he can afford to let alone. Henry David Thoreau

Consumption is the sole end and purpose of all production; and the interest of the producer ought to be attended to, only so far as it may be necessary for promoting that of the consumer. Adam Smith

Love people, use things. The opposite doesn’t work. Joshua Fields Millburn

Mass consumption, advertising, and mass art are a corporate Frankenstein; while they reinforce the system, they also undermine it. Ellen Willis

Capitalism is selfishness elevated to a system. Gerald Dunkl

A conception not reducible to the small change of daily experience is like a currency not exchangeable for articles of consumption; it is not a symbol, but a fraud. George Santayana

Many would like to live a simpler life if the way to get there wasn’t too complicated. Justus Jonas

Such lifestyle factors such as cigarette smoking, excessive alcohol consumption, little physical activity and low dietary calcium intake are risk factors for osteoporosis as well as for many other non communicable diseases. Gro Harlem Brundtland

Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful. William Morris

Art is the production of objects for consumption, to be used and discarded while waiting for a new world in which man will have succeeded in freeing himself of everything, even of his own consciousness. Eugenio Montale

Greed is always the result of an inner void. Erich Fromm

Even the bands I dig don’t have a history of attaining mass consumption. Evan Dando

The unexamined life is not worth living. Socrates

It is not government’s job to mandate responsibility on our behalf. We have the intelligence and good sense to make wise consumption choices for ourselves and our children. It is up to us to do what is best for our health and our children’s health. Michael Dean Crapo

The poor lack much, the greedy everything. Publilius Syrus

That dichotomy between the public consumption of the work and my intent and practice in making it is an uneasy one for me, on occasion. Jock Sturges

Do not let your happiness depend on something you may lose. C. S. Lewis

A massive campaign must be launched to restore a high quality environment in North America and to de develop the United States. De development means bringing our economic system especially patterns of consumption into line with the realities of ecology and the global resource situation. Redistribution of wealth both within and among nations is absolutely essential, if a decent life is to be provided for every human being. John Holdren

Sorting out the unessential is the core of all wisdom in life. Laozi

A drug is neither moral nor immoral it’s a chemical compound. The compound itself is not a menace to society until a human being treats it as if consumption bestowed a temporary license to act like an asshole. Frank Zappa

Formula of my happiness one yes, one no, one straight line, one goal. Friedrich Nietzsche

The sick man must follow his illness to the place where it is treated. He is set aside in one of the technical and secret zones hospitals, prisons, refuse dumps which relieve the living of everything that might hinder the chain of production and consumption, and which repair and select what can be sent back up to the surface of progress. Michel de Certeau

The secret of happiness lies in the mind’s release from worldly ties. Buddha

In the rare cases where it occurs, a failure to increase one’s visible consumption when the means for an increase are at hand is felt in popular apprehension to call for explanation, and unworthy motives of miserliness are imputed. Thorstein Veblen