Recently, I joined as a Contributing Editor at City Journal. I figured I’d share this interview I did with them a while back speaking about luxury

Rob Henderson's Newsletter

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2024-11-10 19:00:15

Recently, I joined as a Contributing Editor at City Journal. I figured I’d share this interview I did with them a while back speaking about luxury beliefs, social status, book recommendations, and more. Enjoy.

Robert K. Henderson holds a Ph.D. in psychology from the University of Cambridge and has written extensively on social class. He recently spoke with City Journal associate editor Daniel Kennelly about the admissions process at elite colleges, luxury beliefs, and how they apply to America’s status system.

One example of a luxury belief is “defund the police.” A 2020 survey found that the wealthiest Americans showed the strongest support for defunding the police. Since then, murder rates in the U.S. have soared. The poor—who were least supportive of defunding the police—have been the primary victims. The poor reap what the luxury-belief class sows.

I developed the concept after interacting with students and graduates of elite universities, and reading classic texts by Thorstein Veblen, Pierre Bourdieu, Paul Fussell, and others.