[...] Rather than an affluent society, Baudrillard argues that we live in a 'growth society'. However, this growth brings us no closer to being an affluent society. Growth produces both wealth and poverty. In fact, growth is a function of poverty; growth is needed to contain the poor and maintain the system. While he is not always consistent on this, Baudrillard argues that the growth society is, in fact, the opposite of the affluent society. Its inherent tensions lead to psychological pauperization as well as systematic penury (see later) since `needs' will always outstrip the production of goods. Since both wealth and shortage are inherent in the system, efforts like those proposed by Galbraith to solve the problem of poverty are doomed to failure. [...]

[...] Rather than a reciprocal sharing of what people have, modern society is characterized by differentiation and competition which contributes to the reality and the sense that there is never enough. Since the problem lies in social relationships (or in the social logic), it will not be solved by increases in production, by innovations in productive forces, or by what we usually think of as even greater abundance. The only solution to the problem lies in a change in social relationships and in the social logic. We need a social logic that brings with it the affluence of symbolic exchange, rather than one that condemns us to `luxurious and spectacular penury'. [...]

If one tries to summarize all of the things that consumption is and is not, it seems clear that to Baudrillard consumption is not, contrary to conventional wisdom, something that individuals do and through which they find enjoyment, satisfaction and fulfilment. Rather, consumption is a structure (or Durkheimian social fact) that is external to and coercive over individuals. While it can and does take the forms of a structural organization, a collective phenomenon, a morality, it is above all else a coded system of signs. Individuals are coerced into using that system. The use of that system via consumption is an important way in which people communicate with one another. The ideology associated with the system leads people to believe, falsely in Baudrillard's view, that they are affluent, fulfilled, happy and liberated.

[...] let me emphasize the point that this book is dominated by that bête noire of postmodernists, a grand narrative. Fundamentally, and in many different ways, Baudrillard paints a picture of a world that has fallen from the glories of primitive society and the symbolic exchange that characterizes it. [...]