Little Differences 3

Here’s an annoying difference between Europe and the States: dry cleaning costs a fortune here.

Which is strange, because you’d think that since the average business dress code is more formal here than in the US, that more people would have dry cleaning to do and therefore the prices would be at least as low as in the US.

Instead, I’m paying 6 Euros for a pair of pants, 7.50 for a suit jacket, and 4 for a shirt. That’s 17.50 (Euro!) for ONE business outfit!

And this in a country where you can get a sack of fresh oranges for 3 Euros and a book-sized hunk of Gouda cheese for two Euros. Just to give you an example, when Ann and I buy groceries for a week, we spend a little over twenty Euros.

It’s almost as expensive to dry clean a suit as it is to buy food for a week. Strange.

This leads me to the conclusion that most of the people you see walking around wearing professional clothes either: 1.) Invest in their own dry cleaning equipment to keep at home because it apparently pays off pretty quickly, or 2.) never clean their clothes.

Those are the only two possible options. I mean, I know they’re not rich, because the economy is set up to greatly limit the amount of personal wealth an individual can attain… so it has to be one of those two.

I think this would be a good discussion question for my Economics class.