Today's business environment has been called a "global village," and many Americans simply accept without question the concept that transportation, finance and telecommunications has made the world a "smaller" place. Traditionally, attention has focused on the benefits to consumers and corporations by the global economy, including greater choices for consumers, and lower costs for companies. In recent years, however, there has been increased attention by analysts on the negative effects of globalization; some of these criticisms are addressed in this research.
Multinational companies came into existence before the twentieth century (the East India Trading Company is a prime example), but advances in telecommunications and transportation systems in the twentieth century have resulted in a profound increase in the number of companies with transnational operations. Some companies (referred to as "global" companies by some analysts) market to different nations, but maintain operations in a single company. Thus an American company might export products made within the United States to other nations, but would not otherwise have operations in the destination country. Other companies (referred to as "multinational" companies by analysts) have operations (production or other facilities) in more than one nation. Both global and multinational companies produce an economic impact in nations other than their "home" country, but multinationals are generally considered to have a greater effect since their level of activity is greater. Multinational companies typically engage in target marketing so that the products produced within a specific country or region are adapted to the unique needs of that country or region. Thus a company such as Coca-Cola will market the same product or group of products throughout the world, but a company such as General Motors will manufacture automobiles with specific features for specific markets. One res...