Snow ball effect

How did our society get to the way it is? Not too sound overly cliche, but America is surely a land of hyper-consumerism targeting middle and upper middle class people to spend money on things we hardly need. We even use 10 paper towels to dry our hands just because they are there to be used. The point Im trying to make is that what needs to change is the mindset. My generation is being brought up in this "buy buy buy" enviroment and many people older than myself are unaware of the issues. It is going to take the effort of a few small groups and companies to value other things than profit. They will need to focus on efficiency, the human footprint/impact, and SUSTAINABILITY. Talk is cheap. These days people need to see the result of new thinking (unfortunately thinking for the better of society is now considered radical).