Are you afraid to look poor?

The desire to compensate for what I thought I lacked was behind a lot of bad money moves:

• Picking up a check I couldn't really afford.

• Deciding to buy things from clothes to furnishings based on what I wanted others to see, not what my budget could bear.

• Taking a trip because I didn't want others to think I couldn't afford to do so.

The irony, of course, is that when you let this facade be your financial guide, you're far more likely to end up exactly where you fear most: a broke, stressed-out fiscal mess.

Greater expectations

Like the primal desire to keep up with those around us, the worry about appearing economically challenged stems from deep impulses, as well as cultural influences.

In "The Overspent American," Juliet Schor, a sociologist at Boston College who is renowned for her research on work, leisure and consumer habits, defines what she calls the "new consumerism."

In the past 20 or 30 years, "there has been a dramatic upscaling of the American dream," she says in an eye-opening video about a phenomenon that will seem quite familiar to anyone who hasn't been living under a rock.

The one-time aspiration for a basic middle-class life "has morphed into a widespread desire for McMansions, the upscaling of vehicles," Schor says. "Comfort is no longer enough. People want luxury."

While this trend has fueled people's desire to appear rich, it's also fed into the flip side, says Miriam Tatzel, a social psychologist and researcher at Empire State College in Rockland County, N.Y.: the fear of looking poor.

Tatzel cites a study indicating that when people live in a neighborhood where they are poorer than those around them, they tend to spend more (and save less).

The anxiety about appearing subpar is a hard one to dismiss, Tatzel says, "because we judge other people based on their apparent status, the car they drive, the sort of house they own. . . . It's hard to ignore that when you know how people are going to respond to you."

Almost as if you have no choice

Tatzel says that whereas the pressure to keep up with the Joneses is more ego-driven, the lengths people will go to avoid looking broke is rooted in a desire to avoid powerful feelings of shame and embarrassment.

"There's a deep anxiety that you'll be stigmatized for being poor. For people who feel this way, it's almost as though they don't have a choice. They have to build themselves up."

Tatzel also offers a way to control the emotions that can lead to unhealthful financial choices.

Based on her own research on consumer behavior and materialism, Tatzel has found that people are more likely to pursue a facade of material success when they are more group-oriented, more dependent on other people's opinions.

"The people who are more individualistic are not as much," Tatzel says, "and they are also, by and large, happier."

Although you can't ignore the consumer-based culture we all live in, Tatzel offers two ways to scale back the sense of shame and pressure to compensate.

• Don't believe everything you think. "Question your own assumptions," she says. "Are people really going to think less of you if your car is not a luxury car, if your clothes are not designer clothes? Probably not." And if you know people so shallow or judgmental, "do you want those people as friends?" Tatzel asks. "You can work on yourself, your attitude."

• Know your enemies. "The other strategy is to associate more with the people who do share your values," Tatzel says. "Change the pressures that you expose yourself to."

Published March 19, 2008

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