Tamara R. Piety argues that increasingly expansive First Amendment protections for commercial speech imperil public health, safety, and welfare; the reliability of commercial and consumer information; the stability of financial markets; and the global environment. Using evidence from public relations and marketing, behavioral economics, psychology, and cognitive studies, she shows how overly permissive extensions of protections to commercial expression limit governmental power to address a broad range of public policy issues.

Written for the ordinary consumer as well as for advertisers and trade regulators, this book aims to demonstrate how advertising can better serve its audience. Ivan Preston takes us down the slippery slope, from the high ground of honest product information to the unscrupulous bottom-of-the-barrel claims that are wholly false. Along the way he documents the subtle misrepresentations, half and lesser truths, and exploitations of our gullibility that abound in contemporary advertising.