Movie Analysis: Maxed Out
Corporations Advantages over Consumers in the Marketplace
Thursday, October 16th 2014
North American culture has perpetuated the concept of overconsumption in various
aspects: food, money and particularly tangible assets. This perception of materialism is widely
accepted and often expected of societies. Striving for such a high standard of living often
provokes the public to come to a breaking point, resorting to desperate measures in order to live
up to this seemingly customary ideal. Maxed Out1 outlines the concept of mass consumption and
the lengths that a society will go to in order to achieve a certain level of materialism. Under this
essential concept that is expressed in the film lies three broad social issues that contribute to this
larger idea. This includes society’s emphasis on a person’s worth being determined by what they
own, a company’s strategic marketing toward vulnerable customers, as well as how the prices of
consumer products are purposely set in place to be deceptive.
With the idea of mass consumption comes the belief that a person’s worth is based off of
the quantity of what they own and the quality of these possessions. Maxed Out identifies the
primary cause of this social issue as the way in which corporations emphasize materialism.
Companies will promote products in a way that demoralizes those who cannot afford to have
such a luxury. This provokes the idea of resorting to desperate measures in order to fund this
materialism, often resulting in consumer debt. In 1980, the household debt to disposable income
ratio was a mere 66 percent compared to the staggering 150 percent it is today2. Society as a
whole is increasing consumer debt, but the fault lies mainly with the corporations who push these
ideals on citizens daily through various outlets. Marketers are accused of stimulating demand by
motivating consumers to buy particular products without having any previous interest in3.
Marketers will do this by appealing to a consumer’s terminal values: these standards are the
1 Maxed Out . By James D Scurlock. Dir. James D Scurlock. 2006.
2 Raj K. Chawla, Sharanjit Uppal. Household Debt in Canada . 23 March 2012. October 2014 <http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/75-001-
x/2012002/article/11636-eng.htm>.
3 Brenkert, George G. Marketing Ethics . Malden: Blackwell Publishing , 2008 .
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mental representations of the perceived value of certain needs4. Evidently, corporations that are
promoting products are attempting to alter the personal values that customers identify products
with, which in turn incites materialistic spending habits. Once companies achieve the loyalty and
acceptance of their product in the eyes of consumers, they will attempt to foster this connection
and a sense of “false need” among customers will occur. This perpetual purchasing cycle is not
only motivated by corporations, but also by the ideal of maintaining a respectable reputation. The
general public wants the approval of others regarding what they own and often base their worth
off of their ability to purchase these possessions. Corporations often prey on this notion: people
will go to great lengths in order to protect their reputation. In the movie, credit card companies
would often call the neighbours of clients in order to reveal the credit situation that he or she was
in. This would include informing this person that their neighbour has been late on delivering
payments, and posing this as a question to the neighbor regarding their friend’s recent activities.
