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                            Introduction
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'The Theory of the Leisure Class: An Economic Study of Institutions'
(1899), by Thorstein Veblen, is a treatise of economics and sociology,
and a critique of conspicuous consumption as a function of social
class and of consumerism, which are social activities derived from the
social stratification of people and the division of labor; the social
institutions of the feudal period (9th-15th c.) that have continued to
the modern era.

Veblen discusses how the pursuit and the possession of wealth affects
human behavior, that the contemporary lords of the manor, the
businessmen who own the means of production, have employed themselves
in the economically unproductive practices of conspicuous consumption
and conspicuous leisure, which are useless activities that contribute
neither to the economy nor to the material production of the useful
goods and services required for the functioning of society. Instead,
it is the middle class and working class who are usefully employed in
the industrialised, productive occupations that support the whole of
society.


                             Background
======================================================================
'The Theory of the Leisure Class' (1899) was published during the
Gilded Age (1870-1900), the time of the robber baron millionaires John
D. Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie, and Cornelius Vanderbilt, at the end
of the 19th century. Veblen presents the evolutionary development of
the social and economic institutions of society, wherein technology
and the industrial arts are the creative forces of economic
production. That in the economics of the production of goods and
services, the social function of the economy was to meet the material
needs of society and to earn profits for the owners of the means of
production. Sociologically, that the industrial production system
required the workers (men and women) to be diligent, efficient, and
co-operative, whilst the owners of the factories concerned themselves
with profits and with public displays of wealth; thus the contemporary
socio-economic behaviours of conspicuous consumption and of
conspicuous leisure survived from the predatory, barbarian past of the
tribal stage of modern society.

The sociology and economics reported in 'The Theory of the Leisure
Class' show the influences of Charles Darwin, Karl Marx, Adam Smith,
and Herbert Spencer; thereby Veblen's socio-economic theory emphasizes
social evolution and development as characteristics of human
institutions. In his time, Veblen criticised contemporary
(19th-century) economic theories as intellectually static and
hedonistic, and that economists should take account of how people
actually behave, socially, and culturally, rather than rely upon the
theoretic deduction meant to explain the economic behaviours of
society. As such, Veblen's reports of American political economy
contradicted the (supply and demand) neoclassical economics of the
18th century, which define people as rational agents who seek utility
and maximal pleasure from their economic activities; whereas Veblen's
economics define people as irrational economic agents who disregard
personal happiness in the continual pursuit of the social status and
the prestige inherent to having a place in society (class and economic
stratum). Veblen concluded that conspicuous consumption did not
constitute social progress, because American economic development was
unduly influenced by the static economics of the British aristocracy;
therefore, conspicuous consumption was an un-American activity
contrary to the country's dynamic culture of individualism.

Originally published as 'The Theory of the Leisure Class: An Economic
Study in the Evolution of Institutions', the book arose from three
articles that Veblen published in the 'American Journal of Sociology'
between 1898 and 1899: (i) "The Beginning of Ownership" (ii) "The
Barbarian Status of Women", and (iii) "The Instinct of Workmanship and
the Irksomeness of Labour". These works presented the major themes of
economics and sociology that he later developed in works such as: 'The
Theory of Business Enterprise' (1904), about how incompatible are the
pursuit of profit and the making of useful goods; and 'The Instinct of
Workmanship and the State of the Industrial Arts' (1914), about the
fundamental conflict between the human predisposition to useful
production and the societal institutions that waste the useful
products of human effort.

Moreover, 'The Theory of the Leisure Class' is a socio-economic
treatise that resulted from Veblen's observation and perception of the
United States as a society of rapidly developing economic and social
institutions. Critics of his reportage about the sociology and
economics of the consumer society that is the US especially disliked
the satiric tone of his literary style, and said that Veblen's
cultural perspective had been negatively influenced by his austere
boyhood in a Norwegian American community of practical, thrifty, and
utilitarian people who endured anti-immigrant prejudices in the course
of integration to American society.


Concepts
==========
In 'The Theory of the Leisure Class' Veblen coined the following
sociology terms:

* Leisure class -- members of the upper class who are exempt from
productive work.
* Pecuniary superiority -- the leisure class demonstrate their
economic superiority by not working.
* Pecuniary emulation -- the economic effort to exceed someone else's
socio-economic status.
* Pecuniary struggle -- the acquisition and exhibition of wealth in
order to gain social status.
* Vicarious leisure -- the leisure of wives and servants as evidence
of the wealth of the lord of the manor
* Estranged leisure -- the leisure of servants is realised in behalf
of the lord of the manor.


The stratified society
========================
'The Theory of the Leisure Class' established that the political
economy of a modern society is based upon the social stratification of
tribal and feudal societies, rather than upon the merit and social
utility and economic utility of individual men and women. Veblen's
examples indicate that many economic behaviours of contemporary
society derive from corresponding tribal-society behaviours, wherein
men and women practiced the division of labor according to their
status group; high-status people practiced hunting and warfare, which
are economically unproductive occupations, whilst low-status people
practiced farming and manufacturing, which are economically productive
occupations. In a socially-stratified society, the 'leisure class' are
the members of the upper class who are exempt from productive work.


{{Anchor|Occupation|pecuniary superiority}}(i) Occupation
===========================================================
The concepts of dignity and self-worth and honour are the bases of the
development of social class and distinctions of type among the social
classes; thus, by way of social stratification, productive labor came
to be seen as disreputable. Therefore, the accumulation of wealth does
not confer social status, as does the evidence of wealth, such as
leisure. In a stratified society, the division of labor inherent to
the barbarian culture of conquest, domination, and the exploitation of
labour featured labour-intensive occupations for the conquered people,
and light-labour occupations for the conquerors, who thus became 'the
leisure class'. In that societal context, although low-status,
productive occupations (tinker, tailor, chandler) were of greater
economic value to society than were high-status, unproductive
occupations (the profession of arms, the clergy, banking, etc.), for
social cohesion, the leisure class occasionally performed productive
work that was more symbolic than practical.

The leisure class engaged in displays of pecuniary superiority by not
working and by the:

# Accumulation of property and material possessions
# Accumulation of immaterial goods -- high-level education, a family
crest
# Adoption of archaic social skills -- manners and etiquette, chivalry
and a code of conduct
# Employment of servants


(ii) Economic utility
=======================
In exercising political control, the leisure class retained their high
social-status by direct and indirect coercion, by reserving for
themselves the profession of arms, and so withheld weapons and
military skills from the lower social classes. Such a division of
labor (economic utility) rendered the lower classes dependent upon the
leisure class, which established, justified, and perpetuated the role
of the leisure class as the defenders of society against natural and
supernatural enemies, because the clergy also belonged to the leisure
class.

Contemporary society did not psychologically supersede the
tribal-stage division of labor, but evolved the division-of-labor by
social status and social stratum. During the Mediæval period (5th-15th
c.) only land-owning noblemen had the right to hunt and to bear arms
as soldiers; status and income were parallel. Likewise, in
contemporary society, skilled laborers of the working class are paid
an income in wages, which is inferior to the salary income paid to the
educated managers whose economic importance (as engineers, salesmen,
personnel clerks, 'et al.') is indirectly productive; income and
status are parallel.


{{Anchor|Pecuniary emulation}}(iii) Pecuniary emulation
=========================================================
The term 'pecuniary emulation' describes a person's economic efforts
to surpass a rich person's socio-economic status. Veblen said that the
'pecuniary struggle' to acquire and exhibit wealth, in order to gain
status, is the driving force behind the development of culture and
society. To attain, retain, and gain greater social status within
their social class, low-status people emulate the high-status members
of their socio-economic class, by consuming over-priced brands of
goods and services perceived to be of better quality and thus of a
higher social-class. In striving for greater social status, people buy
high-status goods and services which they cannot afford, despite the
availability of affordable products that are perceived as of lower
quality and lesser social prestige, and thus of a lower social class.
In a consumer society, the businessman was the latest member of the
leisure class, a barbarian who used his prowess (business acumen) and
competitive skills (marketing) to increase profits, by manipulating
the supply and the demand among the social classes and their strata,
for the same products (goods and services) at different prices.


Contemporary consumerism
==========================
* The subjugation of women -- Women originally were spoils of war
captured by raiding barbarians. In contemporary society, the
unemployed housewife is an economic trophy that attests to a man's
socio-economic prowess. In having a wife without an independent
economic life (a profession, a trade, a job) a man can display her
unemployed status as a form of his conspicuous leisure and as an
object of his conspicuous consumption.
* The popularity of sport -- American football is sociologically
advantageous to community cohesion; yet, in itself, sport is an
economic side-effect of conspicuous leisure that wastes material
resources.
* Devout observances -- Organized religion is a type of conspicuous
leisure (wasted time) and of conspicuous consumption (wasted
resources); a social activity of no economic consequence, because a
church is an unproductive use of land and resources, and clergy (men
and women) do unproductive work.
* Social formalities -- social manners are remnant barbarian
behaviours, such as paying respect to one's socially powerful betters.
In itself, etiquette has little value (practical or economic), but is
of much social value as cultural capital, which identifies,
establishes, and enforces 'distinctions of place' (social stratum)
within a social class.


Conspicuous economics
=======================
With 'The Theory of the Leisure Class: An Economic Study in the
Evolution of Institutions' (1899), Veblen introduced, described, and
explained the concepts of "conspicuous consumption" and of
"conspicuous leisure" to the nascent, academic discipline of
sociology. Conspicuous consumption is the application of money and
material resources towards the display of a higher social status (e.g.
silver flatware, custom-made clothes, an over-sized house); and
conspicuous leisure is the application of extended time to the pursuit
of pleasure (physical and intellectual), such as sport and the fine
arts. Therefore, such physical and intellectual pursuits display the
freedom of the rich man and woman from having to work in an
economically productive occupation.


Theses
========
*Chapter I: Introductory
The modern industrial society developed from the barbarian tribal
society, which featured a leisure class supported by subordinated
working classes employed in economically productive occupations. The
people of the leisure class were exempted from manual work and from
practicing economically productive occupations, because they belong to
the leisure class.

*Chapter II: Pecuniary Emulation
The emergence of a leisure class coincides with the beginning of
ownership, initially based upon marriage as a form of ownership -- of
women and their chattel property -- as evidence of prowess. As such,
the material consumption of the leisure class has little to do with
either comfort or subsistence, and much to do with social esteem from
the community, and thus with self-respect.


*Chapter III: Conspicuous Leisure
Among the lower social classes, a man's reputation as a diligent,
efficient, and productive worker is the highest form of pecuniary
emulation of the leisure class available to him in society. Yet, among
the social strata of the leisure class, manual labor is perceived as a
sign of social and economic weakness; thus, the defining, social
characteristics of the leisure class are the exemption from useful
employment and the practice of conspicuous leisure as a non-productive
consumption of time.

*Chapter IV: Conspicuous Consumption
Theoretically, the consumption of luxury products (goods and services)
is limited to the leisure class, because the working classes have
other, more important, things and activities on which to spend their
limited income, their wages. Yet, such is not the case, because the
lower classes consume expensive alcoholic beverages and narcotic
drugs. In doing so, the working classes seek to emulate the standards
of life and play of the leisure class, because they are the people at
the head of the social structure in point of reputability. In that
emulation of the leisure class, social manners are a result of the
non-productive, consumption of time by the upper social classes; thus
the social utility of conspicuous consumption and of conspicuous
leisure lies in their wastefulness of time and resources.

*Chapter V: The Pecuniary Standard of Living
In a society of industrialised production (of goods and services), the
habitual consumption of products establishes a person's standard of
living; therefore, it is more difficult to do without products than it
is to continually add products to one's way of life. Moreover, upon
achieving self-preservation (food and shelter), the needs of
conspicuous waste determine the economic and industrial improvements
of society.

*Chapter VI: Pecuniary Canons of Taste
To the leisure class, a material object becomes a product of
conspicuous consumption when it is integrated to the canon of
honorific waste, by being regarded either as beautiful or worthy of
possession for itself. Consequently, to the lower classes, possessing
such an object becomes an exercise in the pecuniary emulation of the
leisure class. Therefore, an 'objet d'art' made of precious metal and
gemstones is a more popular possession than is an object of art made
of equally beautiful, but less expensive materials, because a high
price can masquerade as beauty that appeals to the sense of social
prestige of the possessor-consumer.

*Chapter VII: Dress as an Expression of the Pecuniary Culture
In a consumer society, the function of clothes is to define the wearer
as a man or as a woman who belongs to a given social class, not for
protection from the environment. Clothing also indicates that the
wearer's livelihood does not depend upon economically productive
labor, such as farming and manufacturing, which activities require
protective clothing. Moreover, the symbolic function of clothes
indicates that the wearer belongs to the leisure class, and can afford
to buy new clothes when the fashion changes.

*Chapter VIII: Industrial Exemption and Conservatism
A society develops through the establishment of institutions (social,
governmental, economic, etc.) modified only in accordance with ideas
from the past, in order to maintain societal stability. Politically,
the leisure class maintain their societal dominance, by retaining
out-dated aspects of the political economy; thus, their opposition to
socio-economic progressivism to the degree that they consider
political conservatism, nationalism, and political reaction as
honorific features of the leisure class.

*Chapter IX: The Conservation of Archaic Traits
The existence of the leisure class influences the behaviour of the
individual man and woman, by way of social ambition. To rise in
society, a person from a lower class emulates the characteristics of
the desired upper class; he or she assumes the habits of economic
consumption and social attitudes (archaic traits of demeanour in
speech, dress, and manners). In pursuit of social advancement, and
concomitant social prestige, the man and the woman who rid themselves
of scruple and honesty will more readily rise into a stratum of the
leisure class.

*Chapter X: Modern Survivals of Prowess
As owners of the means of production, the leisure class benefit from,
but do not work in, the industrial community, and do not materially
contribute to the commonweal (the welfare of the public) but do
consume the goods and services produced by the working classes. As
such, the individual success (social and economic) of a person derives
from his or her astuteness and ferocity, which are character traits
nurtured by the pecuniary culture of the consumer society.


*Chapter XI: The Belief in Luck
The belief in the concept of 'luck' (Fortuna) is one reason why people
gamble; likewise follows the belief that luck is a part of achieving
socio-economic success, rather than the likelier reason of social
connections derived from a person's social class and social stratum.
Within the social strata of the leisure class, the belief in luck is
greater in the matter of sport (wherein physical prowess does matter)
because of personal pride, and the concomitant social prestige; hence,
gambling is a display of conspicuous consumption and of conspicuous
leisure. Nonetheless, gambling (the belief in luck) is a social
practice common to every social class of society.

*Chapter XII: Devout Observances
The existence, function, and practice of religion in a
socially-stratified society, is a form of abstract conspicuous
consumption for and among the members of the person's community, of
devotion to the value system that justifies the existence of his or
her social class. As such, attending church services, participating in
religious rites, and paying tithes, are a form of conspicuous leisure.

*Chapter XIII: Survivals of the Non-invidious Interest
The clergy and the women who are members of the leisure class function
as objects of vicarious leisure, thus, it is morally impossible for
them to work and productively contribute to society. As such,
maintaining a high social-class is more important for a woman of the
leisure class, than it is for a man of the leisure class. Women,
therefore, are the greatest indicators of a man's socio-economic
standing in his respective community. In a consumer society, how a
woman spends her time and what activities she does with her time
communicate the social standing of her husband, her family, and her
social class.

*Chapter XIV: The Higher Learning as an Expression of the Pecuniary
Culture
Education (academic, technical, religious) is a form of conspicuous
leisure, because it does not directly contribute to the economy of
society. Therefore, high-status, ceremonial symbols of book-learning,
such as the gown and mortar-board-cap of the university graduate
educated in abstract subjects (science, mathematics, philosophy, etc.)
are greatly respected, whereas certificates, low-status, ceremonial
symbols of practical schooling (technology, manufacturing, etc.) are
not greatly respected to the same degree, because the contemporary
university is a leisure-class institution.


Literary style
================
In 'The Theory of the Leisure Class', Veblen used idiosyncratic and
satirical language to identify, describe, and explain the consumerist
mores of American modern society in the 19th century; thus, about the
impracticality of etiquette as a form of conspicuous leisure, Veblen
said:



In contrast, Veblen used objective language in 'The Theory of Business
Enterprise' (1904), which analyses the business-cycle behaviours of
businessmen. In his introduction to the 1973 edition, the economist
John Kenneth Galbraith said that 'The Theory of the Leisure Class' is
Veblen's intellectual put-down of American society. That Veblen spoke
satirically in order to soften the negative implications of his
socio-economic analyses of the U.S. social-class system, facts that
are more psychologically threatening to the American ego and the
'status quo', than the negative implications of Karl Marx's analyses.
That, unlike Marx, who asserted capitalism as superior to feudalism in
providing products (goods and services) for mass consumption, Veblen
did not recognise such a distinction. For him capitalism was one form
of economic barbarism, and that goods and services produced for
conspicuous consumption are fundamentally worthless.

In the Introduction to the 1967 edition of 'The Theory of the Leisure
Class', economist Robert Lekachman said that Veblen was a misanthrope:


19th century
==============
The success of 'The Theory of the Leisure Class' (1899) derived from
the fidelity, veracity, and accuracy of Veblen's reportage about the
socio-economic behaviours of the American system of social classes.
Additional to the success (financial, academic, social) accrued to him
by the book, a social-scientist colleague told Veblen that the
sociology of gross consumerism catalogued in 'The Theory of the
Leisure Class' had much "fluttered the dovecotes of the East",
especially in the Ivy League academic Establishment.

In the two-part book review "An Opportunity for American Fiction"
(April-May 1899), the critic William Dean Howells made Veblen's
treatise the handbook of sociology and economics for the American
intelligentsia of the early 20th century. Reviewing first the
economics and then the social satire in 'The Theory of the Leisure
Class', Howells said that social-class anxiety impels American society
to wasteful consumerism, especially the pursuit of social prestige.
That despite social classes being alike in most stratified societies,
the novelty of the American social-class system was that the leisure
class had only recently appeared in U.S. history.

Asking for a novelist to translate into fiction what the
social-scientist Veblen had reported, Howells concluded that a novel
of manners was an opportunity for American fiction to accessibly
communicate the satire in 'The Theory of the Leisure Class':



In the 'Journal of Political Economy' (September 1899), the book
reviewer John Cummings said:
As a contribution to the general theory of sociology, Dr. Veblen's
'The Theory of the Leisure Class' requires no other commendation for
its scholarly performance than that which a casual reading of the work
readily inspires. Its highly original character makes any abridgement
of it exceedingly difficult and inadequate, and such an abridgement
cannot be even attempted here ... The following pages, however, are
devoted to a discussion of certain points of view in which the author
seems, to the writer [Cummings], to have taken an incomplete survey of
the facts, or to have allowed his interpretation of facts to be
influenced by personal animus.


20th century
==============
In the essay "Prof. Veblen" (1919) the intellectual H. L. Mencken
addressed the matters of Americans' social psychology reported in 'The
Theory of the Leisure Class' (1899), by asking:



In the essay "The Dullest Book of The Month: Dr. Thorstein Veblen Gets
the Crown of Deadly Nightshade" (1919), after addressing the content
of 'The Theory of the Leisure Class', the book reviewer Robert
Benchley addressed the subject of who are readers to whom Veblen
speaks, that: the Doctor has made one big mistake, however. He has
presupposed, in writing this book, the existence of a [social] class
with much more leisure than any class in the world ever
possessed--for, has he not counted on a certain number of readers?


In the Introduction to the 1934 edition, the economist Stuart Chase
said that the Great Depression (1929-1941) had vindicated Veblen the
economist, because 'The Theory of the Leisure Class' had unified "the
outstanding economists of the world". In the foreword to the 1953
edition, sociologist C. Wright Mills said that Veblen was "the best
critic of America that America has ever produced". In the Introduction
to the 1973 edition of the book, economist John Kenneth Galbraith
addressed the author as subject, and said that Veblen was a man of his
time, and that 'The Theory of the Leisure Class'--published in
1899--reflected Veblen's 19th-century world view. That in his person
and personality, the social scientist Veblen was neglectful of his
grooming and tended to be disheveled; that he suffered social
intolerance for being an intellectual and an agnostic in a society of
superstitious and anti-intellectual people, and so tended to curtness
with less intelligent folk.

John Dos Passos writes of Veblen in his trilogy novel 'U.S.A', in the
third novel (1933), 'The Big Money.' There, as one of Passos' highly
subjective portraits of historical figures throughout the trilogy,
Veblen is bio-sketched in THE BITTER DRINK in about 10 pages,
referring presumably in that title to the hemlock Socrates was forced
to drink for his supposed crimes.  The portrait ends with these three
final lines: "but his memorial remains/riveted into the language/the
sharp clear prism of his mind."

In 'The Worldly Philosophers: The Lives, Times, and Ideas of the Great
Economic Thinkers' (1953), the historian of economics Robert
Heilbroner said that Veblen's socio-economic theories applied to the
Gilded Age (1870-1900) of gross materialism and political corruption
in the U.S. of the 19th century, but are inapplicable in 21st-century
economics, because 'The Theory of the Leisure Class' is specific to
U.S. society in general, and to the society of Chicago in particular.
In that vein, in 'No Rest for the Wealthy' (2009), the journalist
Daniel Gross said:


                              See also
======================================================================
* Affluenza
* Anti-consumerism
* Keeping up with the Joneses
* Downshifting (lifestyle)
* Frugality
* Over-consumption
* Signalling theory
* Simple living
* Veblen good
* Feminism


                             References
======================================================================
;Notes


;Bibliography

*
*  A version of this paper is available
[https://web.archive.org/web/20131203012459/http://arno.uvt.nl/show.cgi?fid=3468;h=repec:dgr:kubwor:19967
here]
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                           External links
======================================================================
*
*
* [http://www.geocities.ws/veblenite/reviews.html Reviews of 'The
Theory of the Leisure Class']
*
[https://pages.nyu.edu/jackson/analysis.of.inequality/Readings/Veblen%20-%20Theory%20of%20the%20Leisure%20Class%20-%20Excerpts.html
Selective excerpts]
*


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