>
> > I fail to see how corporations can be considered anything other than the
> > logical consequences of demand for products. It can't be the case that
> > supply creates demand. It must be the case that buyers consider certain
> > products will make life nicer.
> > -- Wat Tyler
> >
>
> Couldn't let that one go. OK, sure, that's the *theory*, and we are
> all can be led to think that corporations got big only because they
> created goods we had a demand for. The corollary, of course, is
> that smaller companies went out of business because they created
> goods nobody wanted to buy. It's naive, but that's the popular
> theory. And so we look at large multinationals in that light, and we
> conclude that "capitalism works". And, if only little old me could
> create goods that people demand then I will be rich like them.
>
> It never occurs to us that big-money multinationals *create* demand
> for products we would never normally desire. They have the
> advertising dollars to saturate our eyes and ears with advertising
> images and slogans that stick in our minds until we buy the product.
> The ability to *create* a demand for products we previously had no
> desire for is not only as old as capitalism, but the ability to "sell
> ice to an Eskimo" is the mark of a top salesman. Salespeople know
> that there are elements of seduction and rhetoric in making the sale,
> and more often than not selling less to do with the person's "need"
> and more to do with creating a "desire" for the product in the mind
> of the buyer.
>
>

This argument is not complete yet. I can't do it full justice right
now. But I do not mean to say that successful corporations
necessarily have the most sucecssful salespeople. They just have the
money to spend on advertising that creates the consumer demand for
the goods and services. As to the point I made about an "average Joe"
becoming a big-money conglomerate, there is no longer a problem with
demand, there is a problem with distribution. Multinational
corporations having lots of money to afford elaborate distribution
networks stand a better chance of being successful even though they
have inferior products. In fact the small company with the inferior
distribution and superior product may even be driven out of business.

Of course there are many other things I wish to say that I don't have
time for. I'll pick up on it some other time.