Ample Sufficiency

So to kick off my series on NZ versus the USA in terms of living, working, and bringing up a family I thought I better explain a little cultural basis. One of my mother’s favorite phrases is “ample sufficiency”. To use it in a sentence: “No, I’d rather not have another chicken wing, I’ve had ample sufficiency”. It wasn’t until I was back in NZ this time that I realized exactly what this really meant, how it flowed out into the greater vision of the NZ state f being, and how starkly different it was to the US perspective on things. Now excuse me while I digress into generalizations …
In NZ, most of the people I know are aiming at “ample sufficiency”. They want enough money, a interesting enough job, something close enough to family to be happy. They don’t need the best car in the neighbourhood, they don’t need the largest house in the city, they don’t need many of the things, the average American family takes for granted. Do they want them?  Oh yes, they’d all love nice cars, big houses, something better than the neighbours, but they are less prepared to sacrifice life, love, and family to get these things.

The average  American family wants it all, they want the biggest house, the newest car, they must be better than the neighbours. If they all go to private school, darn it all we’ll go to a better private school. The ideal here in the US is: independantly wealthy, living the high life, with multiple houses, a few luxury european sports cars in the garage, and vacations around the world every year.

So for the rest of this wee series I want to explore what my personal po-dunk half-arsed personal socio-psychological theories tell us about the two countries, why this is so, and what I think might change it all for the better.

Filed under: NZ vs USA, New Zealand, ample sufficiency