Most of us know we own too much stuff. We feel the weight and burden of our clutter. We tire of cleaning and managing and organizing. Our toy rooms are messy, our drawers don’t close, and our closets are filled from top to bottom. The evidence of clutter is all around us.
Today, data is constantly being collected about our homes, our shopping habits, and our spending. The research is confirming our observation: we own too much stuff. And it is robbing us of life.
Here are 21 surprising statistics about our clutter that help us understand how big of a problem our accumulation has actually become.
1. There are 300,000 items in the average American home (LA Times).
2. The average size of the American home has nearly tripled in size over the past 50 years (NPR).
3. And still, 1 out of every 10 Americans rent offsite storage—the fastest growing segment of the commercial real estate industry over the past four decades. (New York Times Magazine).
4. While 25% of people with two-car garages don’t have room to park cars inside them and 32% only have room for one vehicle. (U.S. Department of Energy).
5. The United States has upward of 50,000 storage facilities, more than five times the number of Starbucks. Currently, there is 7.3 square feet of self storage space for every man, woman and child in the nation. Thus, it is physically possible that every American could stand—all at the same time—under the total canopy of self storage roofing (SSA).
6. British research found that the average 10-year-old owns 238 toys but plays with just 12 daily (The Telegraph).
7. 3.1% of the world’s children live in America, but they own 40% of the toys consumed globally (UCLA).
8. The average American woman owns 30 outfits—one for every day of the month. In 1930, that figure was nine (Forbes).
9. The average American family spends $1,700 on clothes annually (Forbes).
10. While the average American throws away 65 pounds of clothing per year (Huffington Post).
11. Nearly half of American households don’t save any money (Business Insider).
12. But our homes have more television sets than people. And those television sets are turned on for more than a third of the day—eight hours, 14 minutes (USA Today).
13. Some reports indicate we consume twice as many material goods today as we did 50 years ago (The Story of Stuff).
14. Currently, the 12 percent of the world’s population that lives in North America and Western Europe account for 60 percent of private consumption spending, while the one-third living in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa accounts for only 3.2 percent (Worldwatch Institute).
15. Americans donate 1.9% of their income to charitable causes (NCCS/IRS). While 6 billion people worldwide live on less than $13,000/year (National Geographic).
16. Americans spend more on shoes, jewelry, and watches ($100 billion) than on higher education (Psychology Today).
17. Shopping malls outnumber high schools. And 93% of teenage girls rank shopping as their favorite pastime (Affluenza).
18. Women will spend more than eight years of their lives shopping (The Daily Mail).
19. Over the course of our lifetime, we will spend a total of 3,680 hours or 153 days searching for misplaced items.The research found we lose up to nine items every day—or 198,743 in a lifetime. Phones, keys, sunglasses, and paperwork top the list (The Daily Mail).
20. Americans spend $1.2 trillion annually on nonessential goods—in other words, items they do not need (The Wall Street Journal).
21. The $8 billion home organization industry has more than doubled in size since the early 2000’s—growing at a staggering rate of 10% each year (Uppercase, note: link no longer available).
The numbers paint a jarring picture of excessive consumption and unnecessary accumulation. Clearly, many of us have far too much stuff.
Fortunately, the solution is not difficult. The invitation to own less is an invitation to freedom, intentionality, and passion. And it can be discovered at your nearest drop-off center.
Further reading:
For more helpful tips, here’s an article filled with tips on how to declutter your home. You can also use our Decluttering Checklist to keep yourself organized and focused.
For a complete lifestyle change that will prevent clutter from coming back into your life, learn more about simple living from this article on minimalism.
Linda Sand says
I’m so happy I no longer fit most of those statistics. Life is much easier now.
Shannon O says
no tv. gave all books away and read free ebooks from the library. maybe spend 100-200 a year on clothes. request only consumables as gifts now–coffee cards, nice soaps etc. got off the buying train a number of years ago. time with my grown kids is all i need. :o)
Mel Milojevic says
It’s disturbing the amount of stuff most of us own. And so wasteful. I think we’ve become such a throwaway society. I hate clutter so know how easy it is to buy and throw. Now, I’ve gotten into the habit of walking away from on-the-spot purchases (I am an impulsive at heart) and if I still love it in a few days or weeks I go back for it. I generally forget about it by the next shiny distraction. It’s been a good way to introduce mindful consumption into my life.
Andrea Hartman says
I’ll add to this idea of being robbed of our lives by our stuff – we are also robbed of our time because we spend so much of it ‘shopping’ for more items! For so many, shopping is even a pastime. It used to be for me. Now I fill my precious spare hours and days with things that are a lot more fulfilling – like reading to my kids in the sun, long dates with my spouse and drinking coffee. ;)
Andrea
http://www.just-dressed.com
Julia Kate says
Thanks for the great article, Joshua. I found your web site a couple of years ago and am trying to minimize both the number of things in our home and the amount of things coming in – not always easy with three young kids. Keep it up.
Thomas says
Wow, this is really eye opening and scary! Sometimes I’m wondering what archaeologists will think about us when they excavate a recent landfill in, let’s say 500 years. There is so much futile stuff and junk, so they might say our age was that of willful waste, overconsumption and destruction of the environment.
Their next question might be: Why the hell did they produce and own so much stuff unneeded and poisoned nature?
Laura says
Really inspiring, thank you. As i read I’m pondering hosting a “simple Life Christian” small group. I want to share these great principles with people I know– it is so great to live simply so others can simply live; so freeing to let go of physical and emotional baggage (and arguments) unless they are necessary and uplifting: so good to wipe things and THINGS off the list, take a deep breath, maybe dance around the uncluttered space, and do something that really matters. The Bible says that God’s yoke is easy and His burden is light–if it feels heavy, we either need to ask God to help us carry it, or let go of what we were never meant to pick up.
Sarah says
Laura, that sounds like a great idea! I bet someone is just waiting for you to start it.
Kalen Bruce says
It’s crazy when you consider some of the minimalist challenges that refer to only earning a certain amount of items (333, 1,000, etc.). It always seems easy to do and then you see a stat like the average American owning $300,000 items and it suddenly doesn’t seem as easy. These stats are great, but also sad.
milbrat says
This is a great article. Lots of good points made. Hard for me to minimize when my husband, who builds computers and loves electronics, won’t let go of any part, cord, or surge protector. I’m trying to gradually downsize my own stuff. I have gone through my stuff at least once a year in the past. It is helpful to read articles like this that encourage me. I’m retired and don’t want my family to have a bunch of stuff that means nothing to them to go through (speaking of my own experience with my parents).
The blogger who was calling names and generally twisting the nature of the article and comments completely misses the point. It helps in trying to minimize if there are others who wish to do the same. We are in this together as it were.
I don’t know how many have been to Europe, but when I was there I saw good examples of minimal living among the middle class and the well-to-do.
Shelly says
I can sympathise with you. Both my husband and I build computers. We both find it hard to let go of parts and cords etc. What I’ve been doing is taking stock of the older parts that we don’t use any more and test them to see if they still work. The parts that still work, I sell on ebay and the parts that don’t, I take to Best Buy for recycling. We still have a healthy stash of computer parts, but it’s not taking over our home any more.
I’ve also been working on downsizing our closets. Everything that’s still in good condition, I box up and donate to a local church mission. If it’s not in good condition, I cut them up to use as cleaning cloths or in my crafting. I also recently found out that you can donate unusable clothing items to H&M for recycling.
Jennifer Benton says
Thanks, didn’t know about H&M.
Emily says
#5 on the list gives a whole new meaning to “self-storage”. :-)
But really? This is sad and somewhat disturbing. I cannot see how we justify owning more than we use just for the sake of owning it, when there are people who don’t have what they need.
I suspect the “people who are poor, or homeless, or live in a war torn country” would find the excess in North America to be unfair and disturbing too. Why should we have so much, and not share?