Consumer Dependency

In this consumption based society, consumers try and take advantage of every resource available to them. In the grocery stores and shopping malls, consumers are faced with never ending advertisements and endorsements for products that they should be buying instead of others. “Today, we depend on the advice of honest brokers who teach us how to choose the best automobiles, microwave ovens, and take-out pizzas” (Zukin 172). Consumers are influenced more and more by these endorsements by magazines, noted newspapers and various books, that they have completely put aside their own opinions on products for those of complete strangers.

The writers for The New York Times, Car and Driver, PC World and Good Housekeeping have taken over for our parents in pointing us in the right direction on how we should live our lives. They will tell us which products are the cheapest, which are the most effective at doing their job and even which products are the healthiest for us. Even though these honest brokers are speaking to a general audience have no actual idea of what we really do need, they speak to us as if they will always know what’s best for each of us. By creating a dependency on the brokers, we as consumers struggle to purchase something even as insignificant as a book or a bag of pretzels without knowing which brand is above the rest.