One of the question the moderators asked at today's panel on the Upscale Cruise Market was "Are rich people different?" I.e., Are they still happily cruising luxury lines despite the current difficult economic times?
The panelists, CEOs of Crystal, Seabourn, Silversea, Pearl Seas/American Cruise Line, and Sea Cloud, were presumably in a good position to comment.

Pam Conover of Seabourn suggested that there is actually a lot of similarity across all economic strata. She pointed out that while they are filling ships, lower prices have been necessary to do so: "There is caution in consumption markets. What the upscale customer is looking for is value, just like everybody else."
Charles Robertson of ACL/Pearl Seas argued that the caution is mostly psychological, not economic: "Our customers aren't concerned about losing their job, losing their house. They may be in a bad mood about [the economy], but they can afford it."

Konstantin Bissias of Sea Cloud, which has per diems of roughly $750, said that as of the past few months, while they have not changed their prices, "we try not to use the word 'luxury' too much" for fear of eliciting guilt feelings in potential customers.

So what do we think of all this? Sure, we'll believe that rich people aren't all that different.

But consider that we're emerging from perhaps the biggest asset bubble of all time. Albeit with some likely hyperbole, Blackstone's Stephen Schwarzman has argued that global wealth has lost some 40 to 45% of its value. Lucrative jobs in finance, insurance and real estate that once fuelled the market for Park Avenue penthouses (and luxury cruises?) have evaporated. And meanwhile the current U.S. administration has made it clear that they intend to do more to tax the wealthy who remain. Even Switzerland has agreed to make its banks more transparent to the IRS.

So perhaps the question is not whether the rich are different ... but how many rich people are really left?