new model for china?

Ok, so I am putting two (somewhat) unrelated news items together and I am kinda scratching my head about the sanity of the world today. This may be difficult to follow but I'll try to make sense of it all by the time that I am done.

This morning I was reading an article on the BBC about how the IMF was suggesting to China that it change its business model and put more money into buying consumer related products. It turns out that the Chinese are reinvesting about 55% of their cash into other companies rather than buying a lot of stuff. The IMF is worried that if China continues to do this that it will unsettle the world economy b/c their billion people aren't buying their share of the crap of the world.

In other news, I was watching CNN tonight and there was a story on the broadcast about the release of Microsoft's new Xbox and all of the hoopla surrounding it. Thousands of nerds waiting in line to be the first to buy their new Xbox when stores opened at midnight and began selling this new toy. (I may be wrong but I think I saw the same group of people waiting in line to buy tickets 3 months in advance of the last Star Wars movie...)

The reporter for CNN does some interviews with the people who were unlucky enough to NOT have arrived in time to purchase their new fan-dangled box that hooks up to your tv and gives you an alternate means to blow up the world and rid it of computer-animated terrorists (that's a run-on sentence but I'm ranting so leave it alone). She talks with some 30 year-old loser who is bitching about not getting his Xbox. Pardon me while I quote this man without the proper references but its too remarkable to not write down what he said (for posterity, of course).

"I'm so mad. I took a day off of work to come get an Xbox. Then I come down here to get one and they're sold out. I lost a day's pay and I have no Xbox. What am I gonna do?"

My first thought was - ask your mom to make you some Kraft Mac & Cheese for dinner and then make plans to move out of your parents basement. But I digress, back to my rant.

So this got me to thinking. What has America become? I realize that we are a society of consumers but WOW! I remember the Cabbage Patch kids craze from the late 80's (and the spin-off Garbage Pail kids) when people flooded toy stores and knocked small disabled children over to get to their favorite plush doll with a plastic head. I know that every year there is a 'latest and greatest' to flood American stores and this year it will be the Christmas of the Xbox. But why are we so fixated on buying so much shit?

Are the Chinese to be noted for their practicality in this case? Should the people at the IMF be chastizing (sp?) Americans for spending too much of their income and not saving more for their own retirement? Or does the greed and consumption of capitalism really make the world go round?

I recently bought a book that I am anxious to read (perhaps during this winter holiday) that in part relates to this idea. "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire" - does it relate to current day America? Are the glory years of this superpower over and is this country destined to be invaded by Canada in the near future (maybe then I'll get to see some good hockey games on TV...)? Or is America driving the world economy with its consumerism?

Before everyone on the America is turning into shit bandwagon chimes in, think about it. Is consumerism as ugly as it appears to be or does it really allow for the 3rd world countries of the world to develop their economies by being manufacturing centers for the developed world? Is China right to attempt to hoard its own money bybeing a miser? Hmmm, things to think about. Chime in please!!!!