So, from the video I mentioned in my last post, The Century of the Self:
One leading Wall Street banker…of Lehman Brothers, was clear about what was necessary. “We must shift America,” he wrote, “from a needs to a desires culture. People must be trained to desire, to want new things even before the old have been entirely consumed. We must shape a new mentality in America. Man’s desires must overshadow his needs.”
(At about 16:00 in the video.) This quote was from the 1940’s.
In case you’re just coming out of a cave: Lehman Brothers