Veblen felt that once the consumer purchased the required goods of a desired class and through conspicuous consumption demonstrated the ownership of these goods that the consumer was then consider by society to be a member of that class. Duesenberry agrees with Veblen to some extent but expands on Veblen’s theory in noting that in order to maintain standing within the class that the consumer must be in a dynamic state of increased spending to obtain an increasingly higher quantity and standard of goods in order to maintain status. As other members of the class increase discretionary spending class, consume superior goods and demonstrate the ownership of these goods, the standards of the class move upward. The required level of spending and …show more content…
The drive for class status is fueled by an external force dictating how discretionary spending is used and what needs to be consumed to maintain class status. Because manufactures and producers of goods use the tools of marketing to create a want and need for their products, marketing is the external force. Through the use of all means of mass media, marketing has become very sophisticated in the creation of a desire for product. Marketing uses targeted advertising and symbolism to appeal to the desire for middle class status. John Kenneth Galbraith noted this in the book “The Affluent Society”. Originally written in 1958, the book describes the marketing trends of the mid century. Galbraith writes: “One would not expect that the preoccupations of a poverty ridden world would be relevant in one where the ordinary individual has access to amenities-foods, entertainment, personal transportation, and plumbing-in which not even the rich rejoiced a century ago. So great has been the change that many of the desires of the individual are no longer even evident to him. They become so only as they are synthesized, elaborated and nurtured by advertising and salesmanship, and these, in turn, have become among our most important and talented professions. Few people at the beginning of the nineteenth century needed and adman to tell them what they wanted.” (Galbraith, 1958, p.