the legality of MLMs, the behavior of MLMs within an ethical context, fraud perpetrated by MLMs in relation to both their distributors and the end customers, and the efficiency of MLM as a sales and distribution process. One major gap in this prior research concerns the MLM distributors; those individuals who sign on with MLM plans hoping to strike it rich. To be sure, hundreds of articles have been published describing in detail the successes or, more frequently, the travails of MLM distributors. The research that has not been performed, however, is a scientific investigation of how distributors actually perceive the practices, procedures, and processes of MLM companies.
Simply surveying MLM distributors to ask them what they think of the MLM companies with which they are affiliated is not sufficient. What is required is an objective measurement of MLM distributor perceptions of MLM companies. The most effective approach to such a task is to frame the problem as a human resources management issue. As a human resources management issue, MLM distributor perceptions of the practices, procedures, and processes of MLM companies can be assessed objectively within the context of distributor job satisfaction. Low levels of job satisfaction have been established as the strongest indicator of a person's likelihood of terminating a relationship with an employing organization. With respect to MLM companies, distributors are not going to be dissatisfied and they are not going to terminate their relationships with the companies if they, indeed, are becoming a rich as Croesus or even if they are earning an annual income well above the national average. If distributors are dissatisfied by the MLM companies, however, this situation may be inferred to be an objective reflection of both the relative ineffectiveness of the MLM approach to product sales and distribution, as the ethical character of the practices, procedures, and processes of ML...