The role of intangible attributes of luxury brands for signalling status: A systematic literature review

Previously, signalling status had been primarily studied from the conspicuousness of luxury brands, including high prices and prominent designs. However, less attention has been directed toward other elements of brands that could be strategically managed in order to enable consumers signalling status. This study synthesizes the literature using a framework based on four intangible attributes of luxury brands: user profile, purchase usage, personality and values and heritage. The topics studied under each of the four intangible attributes were analysed using a systematic approach. Based on the interconnectedness of the topics studied, this review proposes that the intangible attributes used as a framework may have a synergistic interaction, in contrast with the current perspective that considers them as independently and equally relevant for consumers signalling status. It also reports the psychological function of these intangible attributes and supports the notion that consumers use luxury brands either to routinely affirm their status within a group or to enhance that status. This review contributes to the literature on luxury and signalling by considering luxury consumption as a social process. A functional perspective on the intangible attributes of luxury brands provides the basis for some insightful directions to advance this field of research.     

The Intergenerational Effects of Recessions

Several studies analyze the contemporaneous effects of recessions on individuals and their children. This paper shows that recessions also affect future offspring, not born yet. By linking fathers and offspring from the Panel Study of Income Dynamics, we find that a percentage-point increase in the national unemployment rate experienced by men between ages 16 and 20 reduces their future offspring's annual wages by 4 percent, occupational prestige by 3 percent, and education by 0.2 years. We then investigate the mechanisms explaining our findings.