Consumerism encourages highly wasteful behavior. We waste our money on goods that we often do not need-- big businesses and advertisers work tirelessly to create an environment conducive to impulse buys. Think about all the little goodies they pack around the check-out in stores. We waste our time search for new things to buy rather than thinking up ways to (re)use the things we already have. Consumerism leads to overproduction oft times (there are many structures at work that contribute to this problem however). Overproduction leads to the waste of valuable resources and energy. It also contributes to increasing amounts of plastics in our oceans and landfills. That's just to name a few.