There was a concept I came across a few years back called "appropriate technology." It's the notion that instead of using the most so-called "advanced" or "progressive" method of doing something, you use the appropriate method for one's objective. The idea is that this provides a good standard of living without excessive technological use that (usually) means higher monetary costs and higher environmental costs.
Just as a real simple example, take natural ventilation of buildings. It drives me bonkers that so much of modern building construction in my country utterly fails to permit for... I dunno... just opening the damned windows to ventilate the building instead of relying on expensive, energy-intensive methods of circulating air? It's beyond stupid that Americans moved away from taking advantage of natural ventilation - the wind.
Appropriate tech isn't the only element that would be involved, but it's a big one. Problem is, folks in this country worship Techne just about as much as they worship Hermes in his aspect of commerce and money. And a people are not easily parted from their gods. This country is more or less centered around excesses of both seeking money and seeking technology (which go hand-in-hand in many cases).