Throughout my experiences traveling along the class ladder, I made a discovery:
Luxury beliefs have, to a large extent, replaced luxury goods.
Luxury beliefs are ideas and opinions that confer status on the upper class, while often inflicting costs on the lower classes.
In 1899, the economist and sociologist Thorstein Veblen published a book called The Theory of the Leisure Class.
Drawing on observations about social class in the late nineteenth century, Veblen’s key idea is that because we can’t be certain about the financial status of other people, a good way to size up their means is to see whether they can afford expensive goods and leisurely activities.
This explains why status symbols are so difficult to obtain and costly to purchase.
In Veblen’s day, people exhibited their status with delicate and restrictive clothing like tuxedos, top hats, and evening gowns, or by partaking in time-consuming activities like golf or beagling.
These goods and leisurely activities could only be purchased or performed by people who did not work as manual laborers and could spend their time and money learning something with no practical utility.
Veblen even goes so far as to say, “The chief use of servants is the evidence they afford of the master’s ability to pay.” For Veblen, butlers are status symbols, too.