In Glengarry Glen Ross, one thing that struck me was how eager and obsessed the characters were over winning con games. At first I realized that their work was to sell crappy pieces of Floridian land and I understood why they might have to con people into thinking it was a good investment. However, I then began to realize that they manipulated not only their clients but each other as well. They were so competitive about winning the Cadillac, maintaining their jobs or just making money in general that they were willing to screw each other over, break in and steal leads, lie an enormous amount, and even resort to begging as Levene so eloquently does time and time again. The amount of conning and desperation the characters displayed in the play lead me to believe that it was not the firm itself that caused such chaos, but instead capitalism as whole.

Capitalism is defined as the competition in the market place. This helps explain why the men at Glengarry were so vivaciously over competitive. They were so career minded that they believed that winning the “competition” was the only way to maintain their jobs and livelihood. They used conning as a tool to have an edge over each other. Their job almost required them to lie to their clients in order for them to buy the land they were selling. Roma for example, was so obsessed with winning the competition that he spun a web of lies off of the top of his head to get Lingk to forget canceling his check until he legally could not. The better they were at conning, the more people would buy, and the farther ahead the men would be in winning the competition within in the story and the “competition” that defines capitalism.

Competition in the work place was so severe that the men in the story were willing to con each other and break the rules and law in order to further themselves. In the story, Arronow discusses the proposition of breaking into the office to steal leads with Moss. When Arronow disagrees, Moss cons him into being an accessory to the crime if he talks. We eventually find that Arronow is not the only one who thought about stealing leads when Williamson realizes that Levene is the one who actually stole them in the end of the story. The hunger to get ahead in the competition caused the men to think about criminal activities in the case of Moss and Arronow and incriminate themselves in the case of Levene.

Author Mamet shows how the power of capitalism creates a bread of very elaborate con men through Glengarry Glen Ross. He forces the characters in a situation where winning a competition equal the ability to be able to lie very effectively. Conning was the only way that these men saw as a way to succeed. It caused them to turn against members of their own firm and even commit acts of crime.