Political ideology and consumers' preference for luxury goods versus luxury experiences

Abstract

AbstractPrior work finds that politically right‐leaning, conservative consumers prefer luxury products more than their liberal counterparts. However, we theorize that this only holds for tangible luxury goods. For intangible luxury experiences, we propose that both conservatives and liberal consumers express a similar preference. This is likely because luxury products better convey status inequality maintenance than luxury experiences. Study 1 confirms conservatives' overall greater preference for luxury goods over experiences, which can be explained by their power distance beliefs, which we use as a proxy for status inequality maintenance. Study 2 compares luxury goods versus experiences against nonluxury products versus experiences, and affirms our hypothesis for luxury but not nonluxury products. By teasing apart luxury goods from luxury experiences, our findings offer nuances in the relationship between consumers' political ideology and their preference for luxury products.