Objectivism and MLMs

Posted by Abaco 7 years, 9 months ago to Business
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I had to ask here. What is the Objectivist's take on multi-level marketing? We've all seen it: the starry-eyed soap-selling friend, "fake it till you make it", etc... I have my own take on MLMs but wanted to hear your opinions.

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  • Posted by dave42 7 years, 9 months ago
    I have never seen an MLM that meets what I consider to be the minimum standard: A person on the bottom level (who only purchases the product and never recruits anyone) must be objectively better off than a non-participant. This means that there must either be a price or delivery advantage for commonly-available products, or the product must be unique, widely desired without the need for elaborate sales pitches that leave out lots of relevant facts, affordable to most people, unavailable elsewhere, and doesn't have a significantly cheaper, almost-as-good competitor.

    Paying $75 for vitamins you can get at the supermarket for $8 is right out, even if they come with fancy marketing.
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  • Posted by Solver 7 years, 9 months ago
    I’d take the choice of multilevel marketing over the threats, intimidation and coercion of the social insecurity ponzi scheme any day of the week.
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  • Posted by Mitch 7 years, 9 months ago
    I think that Multi-Level marketing in itself is Objective and nothing wrong with concept. The classical, a little bit of bile in the back of your throat, feeling when someone says “it’s multilevel marketing” is because of the implementation by people will little to no objective reasoning. The people that run a multilevel marketing campaign objectively doesn’t target people that they know will not follow through and simply exhaust the sales channel of friends and family before the burnout.
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  • Posted by freedomforall 7 years, 9 months ago
    It's another method of selling usually by someone without capital for traditional channels.
    Most of the most successful companies are led by a charismatic salesperson (aka Bill Clinton type) that I reject as a fast talking used car salesman who is running a Ponzi scheme.
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