Report: iPhone Is Most Common ‘Status Symbol’ of Wealth

The iPhone is the most common “status symbol of wealth,” according to a new research paper.

In a National Bureau of Economic Research paper, the University of Chicago’s Marianne Bertrand and Emir Kamenica declared, “Across all years in our data, no individual brand is as predictive of being high-income as owning an Apple iPhone in 2016.”

According to the paper, if someone owned an iPhone, there was a 69 percent chance they were “high-income,” which was defined as “being in the top quartile of income for households of that type.”

Owning an iPad, an Android phone, or using Verizon were also indicators of “high-income.”

This year, Apple announced their largest quarterly profit in history, despite iPhone sale drops.

Environmentally friendly products, such as solar panels, have also previously been classified as status symbols.