But seriously, the folks that pay for that commercial have to answer to a
board of directors and shareholders.

If you want to be serious, the folks who really pay for those
commercials are YOU and everyone else who buys the advertised
products.

I've been retired for ten years and can't cite current numbers, but
it's safe to say that commercial advertising's media expenditures
alone cost something like two thousand dollars per family per year.

To add insult to that injury, you not only pay pay higher prices for
the advertised products, to cover the cost of the ads, but you pay an
even higher price made posssible by the advertising.

In case that's unclear, what I mean is this: A firm takes a product
that sells as a generic or a private lable for one dollar, spends
fifty cents to advertise it, and raises the price to two dollars.

And in your specific example you won't find commercials over the air for
cigarettes and alcohol advertising does have some boundaries.

I know that, but I thought we were discussing economic waste. The
number you cited as the amount spent on political ads included print
media expenditures, not just broadcast ads.

vince