The world spent over $460 billion in 2012 on advertising. Money is spent by companies to promote their products and services and by political and non-political groups to raise awareness about different issues. If over $300 billion is spent on advertising each year, then people must be highly affected by advertising, otherwise groups would not spend such a large amount of money on advertising. People are affected by advertising, but what does this mean for society? Vitriolic critics of advertising argue that advertising is a malignant tumor of modern society, while supporters of advertising counter that promotions are the backbone of society. While it's true that some ads are as harmful as tumors, critics rarely mention the multitude of benefits it provides. Advertising has contributed to the construction of economies, countries and our modern culture; without advertising, civilization would never have progressed from the pre-agricultural communities that once dominated the planet. Therefore, I believe that the positive effects of advertising are one of the major factors in the progress of humanity. The purpose of advertising is often confused with the effect of advertising. Advertising is a technique used by businesses to persuade consumers to purchase a certain product or service. Businesses use advertising because advertisements have “enormous power and economic value” (Shaw). Advertisements are the easiest way to disseminate information at scale and businesses realize this. With just one well-designed screen, millions of consumers will know about the product or service being advertised. Economically, advertisements are like catalysts, a single advertisement is needed to gain a large consumer base, and like a catalyst, a business venture... middle of paper ...... college, to start a business , and so on. ), and if these people had not seen advertisements promoting constructive ideas, they might have been more likely to have had to depend on others to survive. Seeing such advertisements, many people realized the benefits of creating something from themselves; without such advertisements, society would only consist of the extremely rich and the extremely poor. Works Cited American Red Cross Poster, 2004 Day, Nancy. Advertising: information or manipulation? Berkely Heights: Enslow Publishers, 1999. Print. Shaw, Eric H. and Stuart Alan. “Cigarettes.” The Encyclopedia of Advertising in the Advertising Age. Ed. John McDonough and Karen Egolf. 3 vol. New York: Fitzray Dearborn, 2003. Print. “Strategic analysis: press releases. » Strategic analysis: press releases. Np, and Web. December 12. 2013. .