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Andy Warhol's quote is misleading by using only a single example. How about luxury cars? Multi-million dollar homes? Lobster and steak at a 5-star restaurant?

by Nadya 11y ago

Andy Warhol's quote is misleading by using only a single example. How about luxury cars? Multi-million dollar homes? Lobster and steak at a 5-star restaurant? $200,000 dresses? $14,000 jewelry? Affording a personal makeup artist? Is the average consumer drinking some Henri Jayer or Domaine? No. They aren't drinking $5,000-$15,000 wine. On another note - I had no idea there was a bottle of wine worth more than my car. That's a little depressing.

unethical_ban 11y ago
I've had the opportunity to taste from a $500 bottle of wine. It it not substantially better than a $30 bottle. Same with a $150 steak vs. a $50 steak at a good restaurant.
- TwiztidK 11y ago
  I totally agree with you, but poor people aren't drinking $30 bottles of wine or eating $50 steaks. At least not the poor people I know. They'd drink <$5 bottles of wine and they would eat whatever steak was on sale at the grocery store for a few dollars a pound.
- Nadya 11y ago
  I've had the opportunity to drive a luxury model car - and I can say it is definitely better than my junker. Having a large mansion is definitely better than a shared 1-bedroom apartment for an entire family. Your argument about taste is missing my point: luxury brands and luxury class products only available to the rich exist and are different than a Coke. Think of it like having a Coke or having a $4,000 Coke that tastes more or less the same. The argument was that it was the same product and that if you go to the store and buy a Coke, you're drinking the same Coke that Taylor Swift drinks when she goes to McDonalds, where she eats the same McDonalds you eat. But if she buys a $14,000 bottle of wine - regardless if you think 2 buck Chuck tastes exactly like that bottle of wine - it is not the same. It's a different product. One marketed as more luxurious. Something outside of your reach. A watch is a watch is a watch. Unless you have a Rolex.
  - mfoy_ 11y ago
    >A watch is a watch is a watch. Unless you have a Rolex. In which case you have a rather fancy watch, but a watch nonetheless.
    - Nadya 11y ago
      A fancy watch that is better than the one the bum on the street is using that also appreciates in value rather than becoming worthless. (A Coke isn't a Coke in this case.) This ebay discussion article points out the difference between a Rolex and a $20 Timex. Skip over prestige: quality and investment matter more in this case. http://www.ebay.com/gds/WHY-SHOULD-I-BUY-A-HIGH-END-WATCH-LIKE-ROLEX-OR-OMEGA-/10000000006342403/g.html http://www.ebay.com/gds/WHY-SHOULD-I-BUY-A-HIGH-END-WATCH-LI...
      - mfoy_ 11y ago
        1. Prestige = status symbol. OK. We get it. 2. Quality... Well, my phone is my watch. Moot point. I'm not buying and discarding $20 Timex's every year. Not to mention this says you could keep the watch and your children could inherit and it would be worth more and it totally will still be a thing, just like beanie babies, right? What could go wrong? 3. Investment? There are plenty of other investment vehicles with a lower barrier of entry and less risk. Anything that is collectible can be called an investment, using this as a reason to buy a luxury watch is not very compelling. Luxury items are just that... luxury items. EDIT: Also that article is about buying pre-owned watches which means a serious investment in time and energy in finding a good quality watch from an individual who is willing to sell it at a low(ish) price. This makes the whole thing more of a hobby than anything else...
        Nadya 11y ago
        1. I said skip over that for a reason. :) 2. Do you bring your phone out during lengthy business meetings? I still see that as rude, even if all you are doing is checking the time. Checking a wristwatch is far more acceptable and subtle in that scenario. Perhaps you aren't in lengthy business meetings or perhaps your work environment is a bit more forgiving at looking at your phone during a meeting. 3. Beanie babies were a 90's fad based on thin air and speculation. Watches and other antiques with years of history backing up their ability to maintain and increase in value is a different kind of investment. Luxury items are luxury items. They tend to maintain or increase in value based on that merit alone. Beanie Babies aren't luxury items, thus are worthless only a few years after the collection fad died out. It's written to answer why one would buy a pre-owned luxury watch but the reasons apply to new items as well.
- pp19dd 11y ago
  Hosted some guests the other night and made steak. They were amazed by how well it tasted. I took that as a compliment, because they regularly eat luxurious and expensive food (they work high up in the Cruise Line Industry.) Was asked what I put in the steak to make it taste so good. "Salt."
  - mikeash 11y ago
    I've had the same thing (although not with people so experienced with the stuff as you). It's kind of funny how badly people want to season their steaks when it just doesn't need it. "How do you make that?" "Salt, cook one side, cook the other side, serve."
    - pp19dd 11y ago
      Yeah. Dry-brined the meat for 1 hour with kosher salt and then washed the steaks right before grilling. Seared both sides for a minute a piece, then cooked rest over low temperature. It was surprisingly good, even to me.
  - Cthulhu_ 11y ago
    It is known that 90% or so of the price of luxury foodstuffs is the story attached to it; if you'd say "I butchered a prime cow myself in Argentina and dry-aged it in my secret room for 31 days" or something like that, it would've sounded more impressive. But that's just the thing; most people are far too grounded to buy into that stuff. Or they couldn't afford it. I think there's more to food than just the food, and the story around it can influence one's experience of it.
- beachstartup 11y ago
  i beg to differ. whether or not it's worth $500 is another matter entirely, and totally subjective, but a bottle of cristal champagne tastes a hell of a lot better than a middling $30 bottle of bubbly you can buy at the supermarket. and fwiw, a bottle of cristal (or any $500 restaurant bottle) doesn't cost nearly that much if you buy it yourself. the real price is like $150-$250. same goes for the steak. the last expensive steak i had was $120 menu price, a grass-fed wagyu-style aged tomahawk ribeye - it was significantly better tasting than a $50 'good restaurant' steak which is just a standard usda prime or lesser steal marked up by 2x. a bottle of cristal or a high end aged steak - these things are unquestionably better than their downmarket alternatives - but where this value spectrum goes off the rails is when you get into the really expensive stuff, the stuff that only very rich people are competing to buy.
- roflchoppa 11y ago
  thats because you're a peasant.
- rsync 11y ago
  Anecdote: I have found that quality scales much further with price when the consumable is raw fish. Which is to say, I have not yet hit a value ceiling on how much I pay for very, very good sashimi. And believe me, I've tried.
bko 11y ago
I personally think all those things are overrated and more of status symbols. Think about technology, design, ideas, entertainment, coca-cola formula etc. Those are infinitely reproducible and are catered to the masses. On the subway I see all walks of life with the best cell phone(s) money can buy which is kind of great when you think about it. It's funny when companies like Vertu try to make cell "premium" technology items that are obviously inferior to your standard Samsung phone despite the little bit of leather and concierge service. But they get away with it and charge up to 12k for their phone. But I honestly don't think I'm missing out. Also, I can't express how much satisfaction I get from beautifully made TV series. World class entertainment all for about $10 a month to HBO or Netflix. http://www.vertu.com/us/en/home http://www.vertu.com/us/en/home
- acconrad 11y ago
  > On the subway I see all walks of life with the best cell phone(s) money can buy which is kind of great when you think about it. Is it great, or is it simply a case of poor financial management and/or contract incentives placed by bullying cell phone companies like Verizon to lock people into paralyzing contracts? I am skeptical that a $600 iPhone is affordable to the masses when you factor in the insanely expensive cell phones plans that they're attached to in order to make the up-front costs seem affordable at the time of purchase.
  - bko 11y ago
    Well the $600 is the retail price. It's $200 for most plans but you pay the remaining $400 over 2 years in the form of higher "on-contract" prices. $600 is a bargain considering that this is a super-computer from a few decades. Besides, I can't think of another consumer product that plays a more integral part of modern life (keeping in touch with friends, banking, entertainment, work, etc). Of course there are lower cost alternatives that are probably equally as functional
  - Cthulhu_ 11y ago
    $600 is a third or a quarter of what a PC setup cost my dad 20ish years ago, and that didn't even have internet. And that's not even counting inflation.
mfoy_ 11y ago
To add to unethical_ben's point: Similarly a gargantuan mansion only compels you to fill it with furnishings, it doesn't directly improve your quality of life... maybe it's just me personally but as long as I have enough space to live comfortably (subjective, of course) I don't see the appeal of having more space. Furthermore, luxury cars don't particularly offer you anything but a status symbol... even if you can go 0 to 100 in under 5 seconds it won't matter in city driving. The only thing that IS worth mentioning is affordable healthcare and education which have extremely high costs and equally huge impacts on QoL-- which is why there is so much conversation about those facets of life. No one cares that you could spend $200,000 on a dress. That being said, as a Canadian, I don't really have to worry too much about the healthcare part and our tuition fees are generally much cheaper as well. The only compelling reason I have to aim for a "higher class" lifestyle is simply because I wouldn't be fulfilled working a "low class" job. So if you're content working a mindless job and living in slightly sub-par conditions then there's no real reason to "rise up".
stephengillie 11y ago
Please remember that prices are usually set based on what people are willing to pay. The original cost for the object is rarely reflected in the price. Especially for premium items. Find me someone willing to pay $15,000 for a bottle of wine, and I will provide a bottle of wine they can buy for $15,000. I make no guarantees that it's not $3 Chuck. These things are about the prestige of being able to spend so much money. It's a different class of economics.
rsync 11y ago
"They aren't drinking $5,000-$15,000 wine." A $12 bottle of wine circa 2015 is (almost) universally better than any wine at any price in 1950. That's well understood and not controversial. Cleanliness, quality control and production practices that even a home vintner would take for granted were virtually nonexistent at that time.
daodedickinson 11y ago
Dopamine is dopamine. Why is moving your hedonic treadmill here or there "better"? Some want to move the rich guy's "backward" to "save the planet". Some want to move the poor girl's "forward" to "grow the economy". There is no bottle of wine worth more than your car, there are people for whom money is cheaper than you who will trade more money for a bottle of wine than you will for a car.
- Nadya 11y ago
  >There is no bottle of wine worth more than your car, there are people for whom money is cheaper than you who will trade more money for a bottle of wine than you will for a car. Economically speaking, "this item is worth $x and won't be sold for less than $x", there is wine worth more than my car. That statement is an economic fact. I'm not going to sit here and argue over the semantics of the word "worth". For someone to try and twist the context of my speech in such a way is being intellectually dishonest and they know it. Worth as in cost not personal value.
  - daodedickinson 11y ago
    No. Prices are not economic fact. They are opinions. Prices in markets are in constant fluctuation. The price of gas is in part geographically determined. Wine and vehicles are the same way. Every price is relative to who is selling, who is buying, their moods, the setting, their histories... if one changes their opinion of a wine, its price probably changes. No one can say ever that "this will never sell for less than $X" with certainty. A luxury car may be donated, or given away. Some may even pay to have one taken off their hands. This may offer opportunities for arbitrage but the concept of worth independent of price must always be kept in view or the viewer is in an economic cave.

mfoy_ 11y ago
All I'm saying is that a luxury watch doesn't bring anything fundamentally new to the table. There's no reason anyone would look at the Rolex on your wrist and be jealous of anything other than the status it implies. It's not like a starving person watching someone eat.
- Nadya 11y ago
  You seem to be missing the argument that a Coke is not a Coke when someone cannot afford the Coke and has to buy Shasta. I'm not arguing in defense of luxury brands. I live an incredibly frugal lifestyle. But the argument that a Coke is a Coke does not hold up when you move outside of commodity goods and enter the realm of luxury goods. Luxury goods are the counter example to a Coke being a Coke. The argument that a Coke is a Coke is that you are drinking the same Coke as the President of the United States of America. Even if you're just some bum off the streets. That argument fails to hold for any luxury brand item. The bottle of wine you hold in your hand is not the same bottle of wine that the multi-billionaire is holding in theirs. The inequality and "spending money for spending moneys' sake" is explicitly encoded into the practice of selling "prestige"/luxury items. These items are designed to separate the wealthy and the poor. Coke isn't designed that way: it's a confirmation bias. Selecting data that supports a given claim while ignoring all data that counters the claim. I make no argument as to whether luxury goods are a good or bad thing. Only that it is naive to think that income inequality is not widespread or a "problem" because "everyone drinks the same Coke". That is simply not true in many other markets and regarding many other goods: many of which are entirely designed and priced to be outside of the commonmans' income level. >"What’s great about this country is that America started the tradition where the richest consumers buy essentially the same things as the poorest. You can be watching TV and see Coca-Cola, and you know that the President drinks Coke, Liz Taylor drinks Coke, and just think, you can drink Coke, too. A Coke is a Coke and no amount of money can get you a better Coke than the one the bum on the corner is drinking. All the Cokes are the same and all the Cokes are good. Liz Taylor knows it, the President knows it, the bum knows it, and you know it. " The richest consumers do not buy the same things as the poorest in many markets. Sure, they drink the same Coke. They don't drink the same wine. They don't buy the same cars. They don't buy Section 8 Houses. They don't buy single-ply toilet paper. They don't buy their generic no-name brand clothes at Walmart. They aren't flying coach. The difference between all of those markets and Coke is there isn't a luxury brand soda. So of course the rich will drink the same Coke as the poor.