Word Spy - recessionista

n. A person who dresses stylishly on a tight budget.

Example Citations:

She's superstylish, always able to buy a round of drinks and still seems to be wearing a new outfit every time you see her.

She's a recessionista, that New York marvel who's a magnet for a good deal. And in this economy, she's got a lot to teach us. ...

Finney agrees that aside from knowing where to find the best discounts, making better use of what you have is a key trait of the true recessionista.
—Eloise Parker, Frugal fashion: New Yorkers learn to look good for a lot less, Daily News (New York), July 13, 2008

A recessionista is a modern sort of girl who is trying to survive the credit crunch the best she can. We're all recessionistas now.
—Ann Marie Hourihane, There's money on it being a bad time to get divorced, The Irish Times, July 14, 2008

Earliest Citation:

When the barman asks for the second time whether I d like to see the menu, I finish up my glass of tap water and take my leave. He could have at least given me some peanuts. So much for the idea of recession chic.
—Leslie Ann Horgan, "Can you live like the boom during a bust? We challenged our writer to become a recessionista," Daily Mail, May 31, 2008

Notes:

This word is a play on fashionista, a person who wears fashionable clothing or works in the high-fashion industry, which entered the language around 1993 yet, strangely, isn't in the Word Spy database. (Too late now: the OED added it way back in 2002.)

Recessionista is a blend of recession and the suffix -ista, which is the Spanish equivalent to the English suffix -ist. Seen from this etymological angle, it's not surprising that there's a second and very common meaning of recessionista among finance types — a person who insists that a recession is coming or believes that a recession would be good for the long-term health of the economy. This sense of the term dates to 2001:

Indeed, to veterans of the front — anybody who was in New York in 1977 or 1991 — New York's pro-recessionites must sound like the people who hope for a nor'easter to wash ashore, just to see what kind of havoc gets wreaked on the coast. They're like the people who wanted Ross Perot to win, just to see ... What a really crazy, kooky White House would be like.

"That's an ignorant little dream they have!" Mr. Breslin said of New York's recessionistas.
—Jason Gay, Embracing the Recession!, New York Observer, February 12, 2001

Categories:

Economics
Retail
Clothing
People

Posted on July 23, 2008