Over the past 30 years, if not longer, you’ve probably heard someone talk about the changing nature of America’s economy, particularly shifting toward service/consumption industries while sectors such as manufacturing have diminished thanks to massive offshoring, among other things.
You can simply take a look around and realize this isn’t just a theory, but, if you want the broad numbers, in 2021, the service industry accounted for 77.6% of the nation’s gross domestic product (industry accounted for about 17.8%, and agriculture was less than 1%).
Keep in mind, the service industry is a very large category with plenty of subsets. It includes everything from realtors and lawyers to transportation providers to contractors or consultants for every type of business under the sun and much more beyond. The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis often doesn’t measure the service industry as one category, in relation to the GDP, but separates it into private goods and private services. So, having a robust service economy doesn’t necessarily mean that three-out-of-four Americans are working at Walmart, an Amazon warehouse or a call center (although it wouldn’t surprise me if those employment numbers within the service industry, at least for Amazon and Walmart, are particularly high).
You could argue that what I do for a living is part of the service industry. I would also add that, whatever you might think of the product or service, as someone who believes in keeping jobs in America, I have not outsourced my one-man customer service department (even though I hate that guy sometimes).
Having said all of that, there are more specific aspects of this economic structure that catch me by surprise, now and again.
For instance, if you ever listen to terrestrial radio — which I still do from time to time — you’ve probably heard at least one ad over the past few years for a business that exists solely to get people out of their timeshare agreements on a vacation home. It’s a problem I can’t really relate to, for a few reasons, but I’ve heard about what a burden timeshares can turn out to be, and that, like the mafia, getting in is a lot easier than getting out.
So, someone got the idea of charging people to help them into whatever the timeshare version of witness protection happens to be. Sadly, a portion of the American economy is also comprised of scammers, and some of these timeshare exits aren’t legit. Hopefully, there’s a business to help people with that, too (although you can see the sort of Russian nesting-doll situation a consumer economy creates in certain situations).
Another service I’ve heard pitched on the airwaves on and off over the past few years is an affordable life insurance policy for men who are on their third or fourth marriage. In fact, the pitch specifically mentions the problem of “your third ‘trophy wife’†wanting a policy. Again, not a relatable topic for me for at least two specific reasons, and probably a few others, too. I hope it never will be. But there’s a market for it, I guess.
Really, as I encounter these services that seem a little strange or even ridiculous to me, I’ve stopped doing that thing typical of 1990s standup comedians that goes something like, “Shaving club subscriptions? Who’s that for?†(I have no idea if subscription services for a razor and shaving cream are still a thing, but they were going guns blazing a few years ago.)
Like (most) things I do now or don’t do anymore, there’s a reason.
I was in the greeting card aisle of a store several years ago, scanning all the placards that identify which kinds of cards are in what section, and my roaming eyes did the equivalent of a tire screech when they landed on a label that said “For ex-mother-in-law.â€
My brain did what it sometimes does, going to a befuddled state in this case because of the default stereotype formed by a lifetime of exposure to in-law jokes. Remember “Everybody Loves Raymond� That show was one big in-law joke that ran for nine seasons.
So, like an idiot, I snapped a photo with my phone and, even though a voice in the back of my head was saying “There’s probably a reason this exists,†I posted it to social media and did the equivalent of a “Who is this for?†joke. Predictably, a few people mentioned to me that it was for them and explained why. None of them was mad or offended, but they wanted to point out that, in today’s world, there are a lot of reasons someone would still regularly communicate and have a good relationship with their former mother-in-law.
The experience made me feel kind of dumb and out-of-touch, which, come to think of it ... well, let’s just say there’s a case to be made in certain areas. But, hey, take it up with the customer service guy. Speaking of whom, where is that gray-haired, beady-eyed, shiftless bastard, anyway?
