Using Less and Getting More

Published: Nov. 1, 2019, 8 a.m.

It often feels like trash is piling up all around us, and that our consumption habits have put us on the road to environmental disaster. Just take a look at recycling bins stacked high with Amazon boxes and takeout containers.

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But research shows that we\u2019re actually using fewer resources than we were 25 years ago, a process called \u201cdematerialization.\u201d That\u2019s according to Andrew McAfee, the Co-Director of the Initiative on the Digital Economy at the MIT Sloan School of Management and the author of \u201cMore From Less: The Surprising Story of How We Finally Learned to Prosper Using Fewer Resources - and What Happens Next.\u201d He explains why we\u2019re using less, and whether we can expect that trend to extend into the future.