Advertising has also been proven to be bad for your sense of life satisfaction, which is an externality not paid for by advertisers.
"The effect implies that a hypothetical doubling of advertising expenditure would result in a 3% drop in life satisfaction. That is approximately one half the absolute size of the marriage effect on life satisfaction, or approximately one quarter of the absolute size of the effect of being unemployed."
I don't see how the study is establishing causation. It does not prove that advertising is creating an externality, as you claim.
In fact, it explicitly says that it does not show causation and recommends further research.
It's easy to come up with theories to explain it that don't have anything to do with the one you proposed. For instance, higher advertising could be caused by weakness in the economy that doesn't show up in other data (or at least not GDP) but which leads to less satisfaction later, which wouldn't show up in their controls.
I have managed to block advertising out of my life so effectively for so long I nearly recoil when a normal tv advertisement at someone’s home or a bar catches me somehow at full volume.
That or I marvel to those around me at the amazing production value of some stupid commercial that’s aired to them countless times is.
I have no doubt a barrage of ads day in and day out, regardless of economic condition is bad for a person’s well being.
