Hmmm, I always thought it was me, but there really is a natural reaction of dismay, to witness what seems to be a bottomless pit of goods always on standby on store shelves.
In particular, with perishables, I look at the things that won't possibly sell before being removed for lack of freshness, and I've always considered it to be an absurd waste.
The other night, I walked by a Dunkin Donuts, and a garbage bag of donuts and bagels had spilled across the sidewalk. It was probably $100 worth of food getting dumped into a landfill because it was day-old baked goods. But the line out the door at eight in the morning meant that profits had more than cleared that margin of disposable food. How to reconcile that with the bums panhandling and playing doorman all day?
That stores display perishable products for the sake of advertising to foot traffic has always freaked me out on visceral level. To waste a quantity of human activity for purely ostentatious purposes doesn't sit well with one's primal conscience.
In particular, with perishables, I look at the things that won't possibly sell before being removed for lack of freshness, and I've always considered it to be an absurd waste.
The other night, I walked by a Dunkin Donuts, and a garbage bag of donuts and bagels had spilled across the sidewalk. It was probably $100 worth of food getting dumped into a landfill because it was day-old baked goods. But the line out the door at eight in the morning meant that profits had more than cleared that margin of disposable food. How to reconcile that with the bums panhandling and playing doorman all day?
That stores display perishable products for the sake of advertising to foot traffic has always freaked me out on visceral level. To waste a quantity of human activity for purely ostentatious purposes doesn't sit well with one's primal conscience.