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WhichWasteToDispatch 4 - 31 Mar 2009 - Main.MichaelDreibelbis
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| | Our discussion about Veblen and conspicuous waste reminded me of this article, which ran before things started to get really bad on Wall Street.
Are these lifestyle changes based on dispatching the things that are of the least utility or, alternatively, the things that are the least conspicuous? Is there a difference? Using law firms as an example, between layoffs, trimming summer programs, and the like, which pattern do they seem to follow? | | | On the other hand, if the rich could still afford to be part of the ultra-elite, one could argue that the least conspicuously wasteful things would be discarded first. This decision itself would be an exhibition of conspicuous waste demonstrating superior pecuniary strength; these people are so rich that although they must cut costs like everyone else, they can cut the most useful, rational expenditures and still be part of the upper class.
-- KeithEdelman - 31 Mar 2009 | |
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Jewelry, private jets, haircuts: they aren't cutting anything useful. They are able to do everything they were already doing, just less glamorously. Faced with the necessity of scaling back their lifestyle, these people appear to be trying to preserve the appearance of wealth to the greatest extent possible by cutting the least conspicuously wasteful items that they own--note, that is not the least wasteful items, just the least conspicuously wasteful.
"wealthy clients are cutting luxuries that they think their friends and relatives won’t notice...One recent client explained to Mr. Del Gatto that she was selling $2 million in diamonds she rarely wore, because her friends wouldn’t notice that they were gone.
“She said, ‘If I sold my Bentley or my important art, they would notice,’ ”
-- MichaelDreibelbis - 31 Mar 2009 | | | |
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