Your Lifestyle Has Already Been Designed is a punch-in-the-gut piece by David Cain. Consider this paragraph:

We’ve been led into a culture that has been engineered to leave us tired, hungry for indulgence, willing to pay a lot for convenience and entertainment, and most importantly, vaguely dissatisfied with our lives so that we continue wanting things we don’t have. We buy so much because it always seems like something is still missing.

Feeling indignant that he would insinuate that you of all people have been indoctrinated by a consumerist culture? Before you close your laptop in disgust, hear the man out. Haters gonna make some good points sometimes…