This consumer behavior has been spurred by carriers and phone makers like Samsung and Apple, who release new phones every year with massive marketing campaigns. It’s a self-created cycle in my opinion.

This, in turn, is stimulated by consumers who keep buying new phones every year, while the old ones are still doing just fine!

It’s easy to blame evil capitalist corporations, rather than put your hand in your lap. You might be one of the exceptions who don’t have a new phone every two years, but if people don’t buy it, companies won’t put it on the market that fast either!

These kinds of things are always far more complex than can be explained by a simple argument. So if you find yourself with little explanation for something, you can assume that explanation is wrong.

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Do you really know the basic problem: People have too much money: they earn too much. Therefore, they can afford to waste hundreds of dollars a year on fancy phones while the older models are still doing well. So the solution is to lower wages and/or raise taxes. Then people will naturally become more selective when it comes to spending money. This is also much better for the environment!