Americans Own Less Stuff, and That’s Reason to Be Nervous

The advent of the digital age has had nearly ennumerable benefits for consumers. We have greater access to books, music, transportation, and technology than ever before. But many of these advances have come from licensing or renting, not ownership. Amazon, not the reader, owns books on Kindle. Music accessed through Spotify, cars called through Uber, and iPhone software are property of someone other than the consumer. Could this fact have deleterious effects on the future of American individualism? Without widespread ownership, will property rights themselves be thought less of? Tyler Cowen discusses this problem in an opinion for Bloomberg. 

Read it here: Americans Own Less Stuff, and That’s Reason to Be Nervous