Eleanor Oakman: chapter one, question #5

What I found most interesting while reading chapter one was when the author explains to the readers of what we thought we already knew, but only to a certain level. "The market does not provide goods that we need; it provides the goods that we want to buy."  At first I thought "well of course that's the market everyone knows that," but when Wheelen used  the example with the comparison of the importance of water verses diamonds. It got me thinking, if we didn't have diamonds we would still survive not knowing what it was like being in awe of some shiny rock, but if we didn't have water we would all be dead! I thought it was interesting how that example brought the market logic to a whole different level. In a way it makes sense, because everything needs water and that's why it's cheaper than diamonds . Though not everyone needs diamonds to survive, they are a luxury that people are greedy for and that's why they are more expensive. The market only wants people to spend more money than survive, they focus on the things that we want but sometimes can't have.