What is the economic explanation for the high cost of weddings?
"There is the price they want and the price you pay. Everything is negotiable when its a service (always possible, but usually harder with actual ""goods""). You should always haggle and price match your vendors. You can also try going to different vendors and not telling them its for a wedding and see if there really is a price difference. For example, call up a florist and say you need X, Y, and Z for a corporate banquet or for a special event for which you cannot give the details. If you then tell them its actually a wedding, and they blindly raise it without a good justification, move on. That said, they jack up the price because they know most people will says ""it's my wedding"", ""it's once in a lifetime"", ""it's MY special day"", etc.... The same is true about diamonds, their price does not reflect the actual supply and demand ratio, just the perception that has been created. However, as mentioned in some of the comments above, the service provided at a wedding may be different or more involved than just a normal dinner The more important issue is ensuring there are no back fees, no hidden fees, and you have well written, well reviewed contracts. For example, we know a couple whose caterer added a mandatory 20% gratuity, regardless of the service which was provided. Most venues or restaurants will not be making the bar a lose-leader, but they will charge for other things.  You can also save money by buying used or looking on ebay for prices closer to wholesale for the product. I think a good analogy to this is the Recent Time Magazine article on the price of healthcare - it costs a lot because its a small market and its harder to navigate, and most are not experienced shoppers in the area or don't have control over the individual item costs."
When over the long term housing costs in a area rise faster than wages rise, the demographic of who lives in the area changes. The size and income parameters change. A region that was full of young singles is now populated with couples with adult children, that means that the businesses and amenities have to change. At a national level it isn't sustainable unless other items change. The portion of monthly income that can be safely allocated to housing would have to change. One adjustment could be the the lengthening of home loan periods, thus dropping the monthly payment.  This has been seen with car loans, over the last few decades the length of loans has increased. In interesting related event could be the change in deduction of mortgage interest and property tax. If this was to change abruptly, there could be an abrupt change the estimated value of housing, because the calculus of affordability would change. In a nutshell, there are significant entrance hurdles, legally and especially financially. The fixed cost and effort to get it set up is high (although later, the proportional cost and efforts are negligible). Therefore, this is only of interest for taxable amounts of seven digits or more - which most people don’t reach. Essentially imported goods from the country (in this case the US) that is improving against your local currency will become more expensive. For the most part, that is the only practical effect on you on an individual financial level. It is supported by inflation and historical values. if you look at real estate as well as the stock market they have consistently increased over a long period of history even with short term drops. It is also based on inflation and the fact that the price of land and building material has increased over time. "I'd like to see a credible source for ""the highest"", but it's certainly fairly high. Household debt could be broadly categorized as debt for housing and debt for consumption. Housing prices seem very high compared to equivalent rental income.  This is generating a great deal of debt.  Keynes(?) said that ""if something cannot go on forever, it will stop.""  Just when it will stop, and whether it will stop suddenly or gradually is a matter of great interest.  Obviously there are huge vested interests, including the large fraction of the population who already own property and do not wish to see it fall.  Nobody really knows; my guess would be on a very-long-term plateau in nominal prices and decline in real prices. The Australian stock market is unlike the US: since it's a small country, a lot of the big companies are export-driven, either by directly exporting physical goods (miners, agriculture) or by FDI (property trusts, banks).  So a local recession will hurt the stock market, but not across the board.  A decline in the value of the Australian dollar would be very good news for some of these companies. Debt for consumption I think is the smaller fraction.  Arguably it's driven by a wealth effect of Australia having had a reasonably good crisis with low unemployment and increasing international purchasing power.  If this tops out, you'd expect to see reduced earnings for consumer discretionary companies." Unfortunately economics (and accounting for that matter) won't help much with being an entrepreneur.  The main thing you need to focus on is cash generation - you need to maximise this. There are 2 aspects: revenue and costs.  You need to plot these over the last 5-10 years to see trends.  What is happening to revenues Are they growing with inflation?  If not, why not?  Is it because people are buying online?  Is it because the products are not fashionable? Is it because people simply buy less jewelry these days?  Have the cost of the products gone up but the shop hasn't increased prices (i.e. gross margin contraction).  Decreasing gross margin could also be an indicator that someone is stealing from the business.   What about the overhead costs of running the business?  What has happened to rent, salaries, insurance?  Look for any unusual trends.    In summary: first you need to identify where the problem is, and to do this you need to look at the trends of revenues and costs (break costs down into categories). "Just looking at the practicality: Because the total value of outstanding mortgages in the US is about $10 trillion, and the government can't afford it without printing enough money to cause hyperinflation. The cost of saving the banks was actually much less than the ""hundreds of billions of dollars"" that is quoted, because most of it was loans that have been or will be repaid, not cash payments." You need to meet a woman (or man if you are in a state that allows same sex marriage) who has a carried forward loss or other loss that exceeds the $3K/yr they can take against their own income. If they had a loss of $200K some time ago, and are taking $3K/yr, they may still have $100K they can offset with you.  Marriages have been based on less than this. Beware of keeping up with the Joneses. Many of your free-spending neighbors are broke. Basically, the prices of things like what you're noticing will rise as incomes in the area rise. A great example of this can be found in state capitals and college towns, where battalions of government workers or students all make just about the same amount of money and drive prices accordingly. For example, a college town tends to have a tight rental market. Surely because higher education participation has increased there are a larger number of students with debt which means less demand for absurdly priced homes which means prices will drop to affordable levels.  But we can't talk about markets working normally when it comes to home prices which always remain high! Right? Because Individual insurance is vastly more expensive than per person business accounts  Hospital Costs are high because insurance will typically only pay out a fraction of that cost, while an individual is responsible for all  There are many things that contribute to the problem.  If we want to have a fourth world country with health care for only the super rich, that can be done, but that also has massive downsides. "Doesn't higher prices mean higher wages for workers? Wouldn't this mean that workers would spend their extra income and in turn increase other people's incomes? Theoretically, if you want to justify low skilled immigration for ""cheaper"" goods, would not a slave economy be better than a free one? I'm just curious here" In addition to those who are wealthy (not the same as high income), there are also a certain number of people whose professional livelihood is enhanced by projecting wealth/income they may or may not have. For example, some consultants, lawyers, financial advisors or other salespeople. The same is true of luxury homes for industries where entertaining clients and associates is expected. These people are essentially making an educated bet that the additional sales they expect to make will outweigh the additional expense of the luxury items, similar to purchasing advertising. But in many cases, people are either living beyond their current income, or living beyond their long-term income by failing to save for when they are too old/sick to work. Additionally, many car brands that we traditionally associate with luxury have created mid-priced lines in the $30-40K range recently, so it is possible that some of the cars you are seeing are not as expensive as you might expect. What you just said doesn't make any sense. The prices of goods and services are set to suit our income levels. We make a choice about how we spend our income.   I don't think a road sweeper should be expected to pay 5 times more land value tax, just because the area they live is now a favourite with wealthy people, with golf courses and wine bars they can't afford to use and outrageous house prices. Land Value tax would just exacerbate the problems of real estate bubbles. Typically in a developed / developing economy if there is high overall inflation, then it means everything will rise including property/real estate. The cost of funds is low [too much money chasing too few goods causes inflation] which means more companies borrow money cheaply and more business florish and hence the stock market should also go up.   So if you are looking at a situation where industry is doing badly and the inflation is high, then it means there are larger issues. The best bet would be Gold and parking the funds into other currency.