Says Newsweek's Johnnie L. Roberts:

Unofficially, profligacy became passé on Oct. 6, when disgraced Lehman Brothers CEO Richard Fuld appeared at a congressional hearing after the firm's historic $600-billion bankruptcy. He encountered a blizzard of scorn over his half-billion-dollar compensation and baronial lifestyle: a $21 million Park Avenue penthouse, a $25 million estate in Greenwich, Conn., and an estimated $200 million art collection.

Since then, we've seen Vogue slumming it at Wal-Mart and luxury ad numbers drop.

It seems like even if the uberwealthy are not personally suffering, it's now in poor taste to flaunt what you've got. Call it conspicuous austerity: a newfound sensitivity has made restraint temporarily chic. And not all luxury brands can keep up: according to the New York Times,Time Style and Design, which closed before the economic downturn, now feels anachronistically tone-deaf as the totaled items "would cost more than $51 million, or about 340 times the annual income of its average reader." As one woman told The Guardian, "now, when someone admires my dress, I never say it is by Balenciaga or Bottega Veneta. I tell them it's an old Phillip Lim. This neatly conveys the message that, just like everybody else, I've cut back on shopping and am happy to wear something by a modest label." And according to the article, luxury goods makers are taking different tacks: "highlighting heirloom appeal, ", "cultivating a guilt-free image" by teaming up with charities, or allowing secret splurging with sites like Gilt.com, that send purchases in unmarked brown boxes. Says The Guardian article, "the web offers the perfect opportunity for a new breed of 'stealth shoppers', embarrassed about flaunting their wealth, or what is left of it."

While asceticism is a reality for most of the world right now, it seems unlikely that everyone with riches of this magnitude will be able to maintain such a low profile after the novelty really wears off: empathy has its limits, after all - that or the luxury industry will get wily enough to get around peoples' guilt altogether. The Depression, as we know, saw some of the starkest contrasts the country has ever known, and historically speaking, great poverty has never dampened the relative pleasures of money much. If restraint is in with people who can afford it, well, they can afford to get tired of it in a year, too - which is probably what the $175-billion global luxury market is counting on.

Luxury Shame [Newsweek]
Celebrating Luxury In The Time Of Melancholia [New York Times]
Stealth Shoppers Shun Stores And Splash Out On Luxuries Online [The Guardian]

Hot: Beans
Not: Lettuce
People spring for non-perishables when pinching pennies.


Hot: Tall, bony hags
Not: Waifish Lolitas
According to Playboys through the years, older, less curvaceous pinups appeal to men looking for a capable partner to till the fields.


Hot: Slow, Thoughtful Songs
Not: Bubblegum Pop
It should be noted that Britney Spears' "Womanizer" is currently the #1 single.


Hot: Laxatives
Not: Deodorant
People are stressed out in times of economic hardship, which apparently means constipation. But they don't dance as much, rendering deodorant unnecessary!


Hot: Beer
Not: Soda.
Nuff said.


Hot: Short Crops
Not: Flowing Manes
But doesn't short hair need to be trimmed more often? Maybe this is the result of disastrous at-home haircuts, undertaken during misguided fits of frugality, which are then beyond redemption.


Hot: Family Values
Not: Eating out.
The family dinners induced by straitened circs are good for bonding.


Hot: Grad School
Not: Tobacco.


Hot:Suicide
Not: Um...good mental health?
So far just a few isolated deaths have been reported as a direct result of the markets, but overall suicide rates rise (not shockingly) in difficult times.


Hot: Property Crime
Not: Violent Crime
Rumors to the contrary, apparently there's no documented correlation between the economic woes and violent crime. (Guess 1970s New York was an outlier.) However, there is a noticeable increase in petty property crime, idle hands being the devil's playground, etc.

The Hemline Index, Updated [New York Times]