Uploaded July 2025 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Multilevel marketing (MLM) is (by design) difficult for most people to understand. These programs offer a world of pink Cadillacs, white-columned mansions, tropical vacations, and—most precious of all—financial freedom. But overwhelming evidence suggests that most people lose money in multilevel marketing and that many MLM companies are pyramid schemes. So how is this legal? And what are the people at the top doing with all that money?
Bridget Read's Her new book, Little Bosses Everywhere: How the Pyramid Scheme Shaped America, examines the stranger-than-fiction world of multilevel marketing: a massive money-making scam and radical political conspiracy that has remade American society. Read will explain exactly what MLM is, the history of the industry, and the incredible damage that can result for participants—and society at large.
Multilevel marketing (MLM) is (by design) difficult for most people to understand. These programs offer a world of pink Cadillacs, white-columned mansions, tropical vacations, and—most precious of all—financial freedom. But overwhelming evidence suggests that most people lose money in multilevel marketing and that many MLM companies are pyramid schemes. So how is this legal? And what are the people at the top doing with all that money?
Bridget Read's Her new book, Little Bosses Everywhere: How the Pyramid Scheme Shaped America, examines the stranger-than-fiction world of multilevel marketing: a massive money-making scam and radical political conspiracy that has remade American society. Read will explain exactly what MLM is, the history of the industry, and the incredible damage that can result for participants—and society at large.
