Should We Spend Money on Our Pets?

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In his article, Burkhard Bilger argues that pet owners spend excessive amounts of money on their pets’ care. I agree with Bilger because I believe that it is a waste of money to spend billions of dollars on pets, instead of using the money to save human lives or for your own family’s needs. Gail Posner was a millionaire who left money to pets after her death. Posner was a member of a “wealthy and notorious” Miami Beach family. Her home, which sold for 8.4 million, and an additional 3 million was left to her three dogs. This extreme amount of money could have helped so many people who are in need. Instead, it is being spent needlessly. I believe that this is an example of placing more value on pets than human lives. My uncle, Tim, owns a dog named Wally. The dog is 17 years old. Wally is currently on some medications that are quite expensive. Tim took him to the veterinarian right after he noticed that Wally is no longer able to jump on the couch. The cost was $2,500 to find out that Wally has cancer. My uncle takes good care of him. He takes Wally to get his teeth cleaned, and he buys organic canned dog food for Wally, but when it comes to spending money on himself, he is very conservative. He checks the prices online and goes to different stores to find the lowest price. This shows that Wally is more important to my uncle than himself which in my mind is questionable. According to Pet Owners Survey, 38.9 million U.S. households own a cat and 46.3 million U.S. households own a dog. In 2011, $50.96 billion was spent on pet related expenditures. Americans spend more money on their pets’ care than they do for poor Africans. This is another example that shows human lives are not as valuable as pets’ lives. My aunt’s friend switched her dog’s food from a high quality dog food to an insanely expensive one because the dog needed more protein and

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