ARGUING “SHOP”
Editor-in-Chief of Reason
ARGUING “STOP”
Former COO of Timberland; Professor at The Fletcher School at Tufts University
MODERATOR
Host and Moderator-in-Chief
This week:
- Fast fashion: Are its low prices worth the potential cost to the planet?
- Your Sunday reading list
Crisp autumn air is coming, and those of us looking to update our closets as the seasons change can’t wait for the back-to-school specials and Labor Day sales coming soon. To update our homes and closets and perhaps try something new, some of us may buy from fast fashion brands like Zara, Shein, and Topman, along with discounted items from other outlets that quickly show up on our doorstep overnight, thanks to Amazon.
But is buying more to keep up with the latest fashion micro trends advertised by celebrities or social media influencers worth the price? Do we need more sweaters, boots, or outerwear, or is your closet already brimming with past purchases?
Former Timberland COO and Tufts University professor Kenneth Pucker argued that the low cost of fast fashion isn’t worth the waste generated by throwing clothes away after a short time, nor the labor exploitation involved in making them.
Reason magazine’s editor-in-chief, Katherine Mangu-Ward, argued that sometimes it’s a matter of affordability and how much one is willing to spend, and its creation also helps boost other countries’ economies.
We were joined by an extraordinary panel with great expertise in this area: New York Times chief fashion critic Vanessa Friedman, BBC Radio 4 broadcaster James Woudhuysen, and “Fashionopolis” author Dana Thomas.
Are you planning on buying any new clothes or other items during the holiday weekend? Let us know while you listen to this episode, along with what you think of the debate
POINT/COUNTERPOINT
Fast Fashion: Shop or Stop?
SHOP: Katherine Mangu-Ward
“According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average American household spent about $1,500 on apparel in 2021, and that goes a lot farther when clothes are cheap. So this not only enables people to save money, it also means that people can move more easily between different socioeconomic classes. I think that can be really underappreciated.”
STOP: Kenneth Pucker
“The fashion industry now produces between 100 and 150 billion units per year, mostly made from oil, 85 percent of which are landfilled or incinerated. The industry is one of the most pollutive industries in the world, responsible for more than twenty percent of the world’s wastewater, a growing percentage of carbon emissions, and more than thirty percent of all microfiber production, not to mention chemicals released as effluent into waterways and labor abuses. The fashion industry’s success increasingly comes from privatizing profits while socializing damage. It’s time we do things differently.”
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