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Published Feb 1, 2025

No Mercy / No Malice: Addiction Economy

Scott Galloway delves into the addiction economy, examining how businesses exploit human cravings for profit, with a focus on the societal impact of digital addiction and the emerging role of GLP1 drugs in transforming public health and economic landscapes.
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  • Economic Drivers

    The addiction economy encompasses a wide range of industries, including media technology, alcohol, tobacco, gaming, pharma, and healthcare. emphasizes that the world's most valuable resource isn't data or oil, but dopamine, which fuels these industries 1. Historically, companies have turned dopamine into consumption, with 15 of the top 30 companies by cumulative compound return being part of the addiction economy 1.

    Addiction has always been a component of capitalism. Nothing rivals the power of craving to manufacture demand and support irrational margins.

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    The food industry, for example, engineers products to hit the "bliss point," maximizing consumer cravings rather than nutrition 1.

       

    Historical Parallels

    Drawing parallels to historical addiction economies, compares modern industries to past examples like the British East India Company's opium trade 1. The addictive nature of products has always been a powerful economic driver, with companies like Big Tobacco using nicotine to extract significant profits from consumers 1.

    Sugar and rum were the dopa delivery systems and currency of the triangle trade.

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    Today, food companies continue this trend by acquiring diet brands, akin to drug cartels buying rehabilitation centers, further entrenching their influence in the addiction economy 1.

       

    Digital Addiction

    The digital realm has become a significant player in the addiction economy, with companies like Alphabet maximizing screen time to drive advertising revenue. notes that social media platforms, particularly TikTok, are engineered to trigger dopamine responses, creating a mental health crisis among users 2.

    The unconstrained combination of phones and social media has been the largest uncontrolled experiment humanity has ever performed on its own children.

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    This digital addiction is likened to a drug, with TikTok's algorithm rapidly calibrating to users' preferences, turning them into "blissed out zombies" 2.

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