OT: The obsession with brands

Throughout the course of human history, poverty has been the rule, riches
the exception. Societies in the past were called affluent when their ruling
classes lived in abundance and luxury. Even in the rich countries of the
past, the great majority of people struggled for mere subsistence. Today in
this country minimum standards of nutrition, housing, and clothing are
assured, not for all, but for the majority. Beyond these minimum needs,
such former luxuries as homeownership, durable goods, travel, recreation,
and entertainment are no longer restricted to a few
.

A society of mass consumption is contrary to a society of mass poverty. In a society of mass poverty, the average level of consumption is low, and most of the people consume a small amount of goods

Within the current economic system of "perpetual growth", we risk being locked into a mode of development that is:

destructive, in the long run, to the environment
a contributing factor to poverty around the world
a contributing factor to hunger amongst such immense wealth
and numerous other social and ecological problems

Junk-food chains, including KFC and Pizza Hut, are under attack from major environmental groups in the United States and other developed countries because of their environmental impact. Intensive breeding of livestock and poultry for such restaurants leads to deforestation, land degradation, and contamination of water sources and other natural resources. For every pound of red meat, poultry, eggs, and milk produced, farm fields lose about five pounds of irreplaceable top soil. The water necessary for meat breeding comes to about 190 gallons per animal per day, or ten times what a normal Indian family is supposed to use in one day, if it gets water at all.

Overall, animal farms use nearly 40 percent of the world’s total grain production. In the United States, nearly 70 percent of grain production is fed to livestock.

Food is a commodity.
Much of the best agricultural land in the world is used to grow commodities such as cotton, sisal, tea, tobacco, sugar cane, and cocoa, items which are non-food products or are marginally nutritious, but for which there is a large market.
Millions of acres of potentially productive farmland is used to pasture cattle, an extremely inefficient use of land, water and energy, but one for which there is a market in wealthy countries.
More than half the grain grown in the United States (requiring half the water used in the U.S.) is fed to livestock, grain that would feed far more people than would the livestock to which it is fed.