She had planned to visit the Medina in Fez, the souks in Marrakesh and the mosques in Casablanca. But the Moroccan vacation would have set Nancy Yale back $15,000 for her family of five. And after laying off a full- and part-time employee last fall, the travel agency owner in Fairfield, Conn., decided to scrap the December trip.
“I just didn’t think it was prudent. It wasn’t a good message,” she says.
Call it luxury shame, stealth wealth or guilt downsizing. Even if you’ve “got it”–and maybe especially if you’ve got it–economic times like these are no time to flaunt it.
In a time when posh has become a four-letter word, forget about keeping up with the Joneses. It’s more socially expedient to stay down with them. Economic turmoil is giving luxury a bad name, it seems, and not just among the private-jet set, either. The desire to tone down consumption is affecting how some Americans vacation–or at least how they say they vacation.
