People also indulge in shopping for firecrackers. A point of caution and moment to ponder is however whether or not to indulge in the shopping of firecrackers. This definitely calls for a rational thinking in terms of opportunity cost incurred with respect to environmental damage vs. some instant gratification from lighting the crackers. This festival drenched in consumerism also gives outlet to each individual household to think for their fellow earthen lantern sellers on the road.
After all it’s a direct competition and a market layout wherein these earthen lantern sellers who work for months to come out with beautiful earthen lantern and other decorative pieces faces tough competition from the cheap Chinese lights and statues which are often seen flooding the Indian markets . In days of globalised world, such is the choice matrix. Typical Diwali celebration also includes gift exchanges amongst family, friends et al .The festival thus gives an opportunity to indulge in some sort of “welfarism” and “humanism” as well.
Of late, India has witnessed a different wave of Online shoponomics. The high demographic dividend of the country spread across metro, non metro, small towns and cities are found to be glued to the world of online shopping. With the penetration of smart phones in almost each and every household across socio-economic ladder, a one click shopping spree has become more of a norm for the Millenials.
It appears that the part of India that resides in the oft away from metros are leaving no stone unturned to splurge and be a part of the festival of shopping. A recent Redseer report said that e-commerce companies have hit a gross merchandise value of $1.8billion in just the first three days of the various festive sales announced by these online shopping platforms.
More than 90 per cent of new customers for these came from Tier 2 and Tier 3 towns and cities. India has in fact been the fastest growing online retail market in 2019 thus far. Such examples of consumer splurging amidst the RBI reports of consumer confidence dipping to six year low last month ,indeed gives some hope.
It also proves that this is a new online market economics that transcends the basic boundary of economic theory and is here to stay for long. After all, Online world of shopping helps to meet the challenges of diverse geography and provide an outlet for unsatisfied desires and wishes of Millennials.
This is that time of the year when Diwali shopping is an emotion and excessive reliance on emotions to make economic decisions could result in irrational human behaviour. This splurging is however viewed as favourable consumption by most. A research by AP Dijksterhuis, a psychologist in Netherlands pointed out that “Contrary to conventional wisdom, it is not always advantageous to engage in thorough conscious deliberations before choosing.
On the basis of recent insights into the characteristics of conscious and unconscious thought, we find that purchases of complex products were viewed more favourably when decisions had been made in the absence of attentive deliberations”. Thus, the oft unplanned Diwali shopping is not that bad deal.The Neo classical Economists considered that ordinarily people (always) ceteris paribus make rational economic decisions.
However, people become irrational when they have strong emotions and feel strongly (in our case on the occasion of Diwali). In the present times of Minimalism and Marie Kondo theory, Diwali provides an exceptional occasion to go for maximum shelf purchasing. It is as if the festive vibes entangled with shopping zest gives the true happiness to soul and sparks the joy. The excessive consumerism that one often associates with the festival of lights is all the more important in the present times when the economy needs the perfect dose of private final consumption expenditure.
Whether one agrees or not with the basic preposition of J.S Mill that demand for commodities does not necessarily leads to demand for labor and employment or with Keynesian focus on consumption or with the tenet of assuming the economy to be a car with consumption as the steering wheel or would it be real investment and savings, it cannot be denied that this Diwali India needs dose of consumerism.
So over next two weeks, like Becky Bloowood of the Confessions of a Shopaholic don’t cut back on shopping but do indulge in intelligent shopping. Happy Shopping!
(The writer is an IAS Officer of Madhya Pradesh cadre, who originally hails from Ranchi and the views expressed in the article are her own.)