[bee_rider]

I wonder if there’s some sort of automatic stabilizer that could be applied instead.

Tax ad companies, and spend that money on education. The better ad companies are doing, the more we spend on education, the fewer gullible marks we produce, the worse ad companies will do.

[collaborative]

sure, but what do you consider to be an ad company? is a newspaper that places sponsored articles an ad company? accounting for "marketing" expenses might be easier to track and at the end of the day, companies use accountants that are liable and so need to report accurately