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The Pros And Cons Of Consumer Protection

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Consumer Protection: Is it ethical for corporations not to perform corporate social responsibility and provide consumers’ with harmful products in order to maximize their profits?
Nowadays, the consumer’s world is facing always more greedy companies whose aim is to maximize their profits as much as possible regardless of the tragic consequences their behavior often leads to. Diverse industries, like that of food, clothing, and technology tend to overcome their social and ethical duties in order to satisfy their costumers’ needs and wants with products whose ingredients and components at large, are cheap, but addictive or irreplaceable, so that the buyer is constrained either by neurological stimuli or by necessity to purchase the good again. …show more content…

That of corporate social responsibility is today a hotly debate topic given the different positions that economists took over time, too. Is the case of Milton Friedman and Peter Drucker, two pillars of the history of the economic thought, who, during the 70’s, decided to investigate in more depth the role of the company in the society. Along with times, also customs, habits, tastes, but especially information, have changed, so companies face the high social criticism that both consumers and activists for consumer protection do. Several objections are made against the close link between advertising strategies and diseases, for example the strict connection between advertising of junk food and obesity, planned obsolescence of products, for example that of smart phones, smart TVs, and other technological devices, and exaggerate mark-ups. The subject matter of criticism is mainly based on the unethical behavior of most corporations and the threaten …show more content…

According to the writer, playing a crucial role in the process of marketing unsafe products to consumers are the advertising strategies and the “sophisticated lobbying and public relations” (Freudenberg, 3). In fact, “once food industry technologists have designed irresistible foods, the next task the company faces is to market these products” (Freudenberg, 9). What makes the best interest of companies, is the difference in cost of production and return on sales both provided by processed and unprocessed food. Unlike healthy products, unhealthy food contains cheaper ingredients that guarantee the enterprise with higher return. The writer claims that there is a strict connection between advertising strategies and health diseases, provided that marketers’ role is that of creating commercials that will “make customers view these items as irresistible treats” (Freudenberg, 11). Being the major source of acquisition of customers, advertising represents one of the field in which enterprises invest money the most. For example, in 2010 food and beverage industry spent 12 billion dollars for advertising their goods with rather traditional but intensive campaign that according to the Institute of Medicine, would “play a major role in shaping what children and adults

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