Luxury's Bad Christmas

Among all the signs of terrible holiday sales, Daniel Gross at Slate flags a colorful one: a voicemail, left on his home telephone, from Bergdorf Goodman inviting him to shop there. For those unfamiliar with the store, Gross writes, "Bergdorf Goodman cold-calling suburban shoppers? It's like college kids canvassing for Obama votes at a National Review conference." But, as they collapse, investment banks and hedge funds have been dragging down their employees' favorite stores. Luxury retail sales have been particularly hard hit, declining 10.5 percent in November (overall sales went down 7.7 pecent). This may seem occasion for schadenfreude but, Gross notes, "the top 20 percent of households account for about 40 percent of discretionary spending … As go the rich and wannabe rich, so goes the nation."