The Consumer Looks at Competition

Abstract

INQUIRIES RECEIVED in large numbers by Consumers' Counsel Division in the Agricultural Adjustment Administration and by Consumers' Project in the Department of Labor reflect widespread interest in the consumer movement about which so much has recently been written. I believe this awakening of consumer activity points to two significant factors in current history. Steps taken within the last four years to deal with the problems of business as problems of public interest and public concern have encouraged the ultimate retail buyer to become aware of himself and to find his voice as one of the major participants in the business process. In the second place, it is possible that the present surge of consumer interest is just one manifestation of the slow process by which a national economy comes of age. When a nation is growing rapidly it is prolific in opportunities for making a living. Like a colt its legs are long and its head is small. Making money is the measure of success, and many of us are on the make. Even those who live most miserably share in the general intoxication, and pattern their psychology upon the possibility that they too may some day make a killing. For many people the depression has changed that outlook. Those who live by the stock market appear to be out on the trail again riding full tilt to be up with the pack at the kill; but those who live on wages and on salaries may have lost their faith in sudden wealth. This is how I interpret the growing interest in the problems of the consumer on the part of people of average means. The realization is growing, as it has for long years past in the more sedate economies of European countries, that the man who works for a li ing must think how he spends as well as how he earns. Consumers are beginning to look with new interest at the goods and services which business offers them for their money. They want to know more about these goods. They want to know what makes them useful, what makes them durable, that is to say, what gives them value as something to be used, not merely purchased. And they want to know the relative qualities of goods so that they may compare variations in usefulness with differences in price. In short, they want to know how to get their money's worth.