In NYT article Hard Times, but Your Lips Look Great Leonard Lauder, chairman of Estee Lauder Companies, suggests that lipstick sales are a gauge of the economy with sales increasing as times get worse.
Not only is the lipstick theory plausible, “it’s perfectly consistent with all kinds of economic theory,” said Richard DeKaser, the chief economist with National City Corporation, a financial holding company and bank in Cleveland. Lipsticks aren’t inferior goods, economists say, but they could be small indulgences, an inexpensive treat meant to substitute for a bigger-ticket item.
I have a better theory as to why this may be so. Lipstick is a helluva lot easier to hide from their budget conscious and no doubt hypocritical husbands than new clothes. Lord knows no husband is ever going to notice so subtle a change as a new shade of lipstick, unless of course it’s bright blue, provided some shade of blue isn’t the norm for ones wife!
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