Reddit’s RepLadies: Would You Get a Fake Birkin From China?

 This paper, for instance, found three common “inner benefits” shoppers experience when buying counterfeit luxury goods: “First, being efficient by optimizing their resources; second, having fun by experiencing adventure, enjoyment, and risk; and third, fooling others expecting not to be caught.” But, the authors add, “most important, through ... See more

Why does luxury brand Balenciaga sell a $2,000 purse modeled after a $1 blue Ikea shopping bag? What’s behind the craze for seemingly distressed and worn-out Gucci sneakers? What is Sarah Jessica Parker doing rummaging through the dusty clothes in Rome’s Via Sannio flea market? Why is Cracco, a Michelin star–winning Italian chef, using commercial p... See more

As more of our lives move online, the ability to own scarce digital items is only becoming more important, and the NFT-based digital asset market will increasingly mirror the luxury market. An authentic Birkin bag is able to fetch prices hundreds of times higher than the exact same bag in knock-off form because owning the real thing says something ... See more

These goods are the least expensive way to gain temporary entry to a particular consumer class—for example, Gucci belts cost $450, while one of the brand’s bags could easily set you back $3,500.

The presence of many nice-enough choices without any meaningful way to distinguish among them is a fundamental dysphoria of modern consumerism. Anybody can track in intimate detail how the wealthy and stylish spend their money via social media, and just when you’ve learned exactly what you can’t have, the internet swoops in to offer a look-for-less... See more