Consumption in this world is at an all time high, as is depression
I am not sure about depression being at all time high, I think we have better lives than never before.
About the consumption, there is certainly whole teams of people trying to understand what triggers the desire to buy, and use this knowledge to sell their products. I even wrote an article about that a few weeks ago.
Although consumption isn't necessarily bad, I mean, being able to consume things is what makes our lives good, the problem start when people consume just for the sake of consuming.