花大价钱剪个头发是否值得?

Does a Pricey Haircut Pay Off?
Even a good haircut looks shabby after a few weeks. And a bad one usually won't look so bad after a few weeks.

At least that's been my logic over the past couple of decades, as I've gone from one cheapo barber to another.

My wife, Clarissa, has a different credo: A good haircut makes all the difference, and she's willing to pay big money for one. Happily for our finances, she doesn't cut her hair nearly as often as I do.

Hair is a defining test for cheapskates. You can make an argument that going to a fancy Ivy League college instead of a cheaper state school is a good investment. Or that buying a big house in a fancy neighborhood will pay off. I don't agree in either case, but that's beside the point.

How can anybody assert that a fancy haircut, something that begins depreciating almost as soon as you spring out of the barber's chair, is a good investment?

I believe Americans know this and distrust people, particularly men, who are too perfectly coiffed. Think of the pounding John Edwards took for his $400 haircut a few years ago. It took a sex scandal to eclipse it.

Bill Clinton had his own haircut scandal in 1993, when he kept Air Force One on the ground in Los Angeles (supposedly holding up some other flights) so he could get a clip from a celebrated stylist. A columnist back then questioned whether the man from Hope, Ark., was a true bubba.

Has the Great Recession made people get cheaper haircuts? Not according to Paul D. Finkelstein, chief executive of Regis Corp., which operates the Supercuts chain and a slew of other salons, some quite fancy. He says people are paying the same as before; they're just going less often.

'Hair is too personal to risk something you'll be stuck with for a long time,' he says. Visits at low-end Regis salons are down 4% to 5%, but they're down 10% to 11% at the chain's high-end salons.

Men and women have very different views on haircuts. A highly unscientific poll of a few colleagues here at The Wall Street Journal's New York office found two things: No man paid more than $40, and many paid less than half that. And no woman paid less than $80, and some paid as much $300, including coloring and highlighting.

'My husband only pays $7,' noted reporter Ellen Byron, who spends much more than that for the full treatment. 'He goes to a place where the guy turns out the lights if there's no one there.'

Now I'm jealous. Seven dollars is hard to top.

From 2001 to 2004, I lived in Verona, N.J., where I went to a barber shop that charged $9 a haircut. I recently called back the barber, Dino Ditizii, who has been working there since 1962.

Dino thinks he last raised prices 13 or 14 years ago. 'I don't remember,' he says, 'A long time ago.' He spends seven minutes or so on the average haircut. The customers get jumpy if takes much longer. 'If I take 10 minutes, they start to look at the clock,' he says.

Nowadays, I live in a different New Jersey town, where I can walk to the barber shop. It costs $16, not a bad price. It's certainly not worth driving half an hour to save a few bucks.

Clarissa spends more like $110 to get her hair cut and 'glazed,' whatever that is. But she'll go three months between cuts, while I get one every three or four weeks.

Our 18-year-old, Brendon, goes us one better by combining my approach and Clarissa's. He goes to the same cheap shop as I do, but very infrequently. Once he got a crewcut and didn't cut it again until it was a shoulder-length mop.

As a parent, I was appalled. But as a cheapskate, I applaud him.

All this pales compared to our 23-year-old daughter, Mariana. Last month, I wrote how she had managed to save money while living in New York City on a salary of less than $30,000. One of her secrets: She cuts her own hair, something she's been doing since her junior year of college.

'I don't always like how it turns out,' she says. 'But I don't like how they cut my hair in other places-and I have to pay for it.'

即使是剪得很精致的发型过几个星期再看也是乱七八糟，而剪得不怎么样的发型几周后看上去往往不会那么糟了。

至少过去几十年来，我一直是这么认为的，期间我经历了一家又一家的便宜理发店。

我的太太克拉丽莎(Clarissa)却有着不同的看法：剪个美美的发型事关重大，她愿意为此花大价钱。好在她理发没我勤，这对我们的财务状况来说算是一大幸事。

理发是定义节俭生活的一项关键测试。你可以说，就读一所常春藤名校、而不是一所学费更低的州立大学，是项好投资。抑或，在高档社区买座大房子是桩好买卖。对此我都不敢苟同，不过这并不是我要说的重点。

怎会有人断言，剪个漂亮的头发是项好投资？毕竟头发在你一跳下理发师的椅子，几乎马上就开始贬值了。

我相信美国人明白这点，而且不信任别人，特别是那些头发做得纹丝不乱的男人。想想约翰•爱德华兹(John Edwards)，几年前他花了400美元理了个发，结果付出了怎样巨大的代价。最终是一桩性丑闻才盖过了头发风波。

1993年比尔•克林顿(Bill Clinton)也曝出了理发丑闻，当时他命令空军一号停在洛杉矶（据信还影响了其他一些飞机的起落），以便找一位知名美发师理个发。当时有位专栏作家质疑来自阿肯色州霍普的克林顿是否真是个乡下人。

这次的经济衰退是否让人们在理发上少花些钱呢？据Regis Corp.首席执行长芬克史坦(Paul D. Finkelstein)的说法，并没有。该公司运营有Supercuts连锁店，还有一系列其他美发店，有些店非常的奢华。他说，人们在理发上花的钱和从前一样，只是理发的次数减少了。

他说，头发是个很私人的东西，如果理得不好，很长时间都可能会让你有噩梦缠身的感觉。Regis的低档美发店顾客理发次数减少了4%-5%，不过其高档美发店的顾客理发次数却减少了10%-11%。

男人和女人对理发的看法迥然不同。对《华尔街日报》纽约办公室的一些同事进行的非常缺乏科学性的调查显示出了两点：男人在理发上花的钱没有超过40美元的，很多男人还不到20美元；女人则都不少于80美元，有些甚至会花300美元，又是染发，又是挑染。

记者拜伦(Ellen Byron)说，我丈夫理发只要七美元。而她本人在全套美发服务上花的钱要远比这多。她说，我丈夫去理发的地方，当没有顾客的时候，理发师会把灯都关掉。

我嫉妒她的丈夫。七美元理个发对我来说是个难以企及的高度。

2001年至2004年，我住在新泽西州维罗纳，我去的理发店收费是九美元。最近我打电话给那里的理发师蒂提兹(Dino Ditizii)。他从1962年就一直在那里工作。

蒂提兹回忆说，他最近一次涨价是在13年或14年之前。他说，我不记得了，那是很久之前的事了。他理一个头发一般要七分钟左右。如果时间太长，顾客会不耐烦的。他说，如果花十分钟，顾客就会开始看表。

如今，我住在新泽西州另外一个城镇，我可以走路去理发店。理一个头发花16美元，价格还算可以。要是为了省几块钱就得开车奔波半小时当然不值得了。

克拉丽莎做头发无论是什么项目都能花上110美元以上。不过她要三个月才做一次头发，而我每三、四周就会理一次头发。

我们18岁的儿子布兰顿(Brendon)则做得更妙，他把我和他妈妈的做法结合在了一起。他和我去同一家便宜的理发店，不过他去的更少。有一次，他剪了个平头，直到头发长到齐肩了，才又去剪了一次。

作为一名父亲，我对此深感担忧。不过作为一个精打细算的人，我要表示赞赏。

不过，与我23岁的女儿玛丽安娜(Mariana)相比，这些都相形见绌了。上个月，我撰文写了她住在纽约的时候，年薪不足三万美元，是如何攒下钱的。她的秘诀之一就是自己剪头发，她从大三开始就给自己剪头发了。

她说，我有时也不喜欢自己剪出来的效果，不过我不喜欢其他地方理发师给我剪的头发，何况我还得为此付钱。