The Affluent Society

by John Kenneth Galbraith

Increasingly, in the last quarter century, the display of expensive goods, as a device for suggesting wealth, has been condemned as vulgar. The term is precise. Vulgar means: “Of or pertaining to the common people, or to the common herd or crowd.” And this explains what happened. Lush expenditure could be afforded by so many that it ceased to be useful as a mark of distinction. An elongated, richly upholstered and extremely high-powered automobile conveys no impression of wealth in a day when such automobiles are mass-produced by the thousands. A house in Palm Beach is not a source of distinction when the rates for a thousand hotel rooms in Miami Beach rival its daily upkeep. Once a sufficiently impressive display of diamonds could create attention even for the most obese and repellent body, for they signified membership in a highly privileged caste. Now the same diamonds are afforded by a television star or a talented harlot. Modern mass communications, especially the movies and television, ensure that the populace at large will see the most lavish caparisoning on the bodies not only of the daughters of the rich but also on the daughters of coal miners and commercial travelers who have struck it rich by their own talents or some facsimile thereof. In South America, in the Middle East, to a degree in India, and by travelers therefrom in Nice, Cannes and Deauville, ostentatious display by those of wealth is still practiced. This accords with expectations. In these countries...