The APC Petit Standard Index
If your city cannot afford APC Petit Standard Jeans, it's going to vote for socialism
There are certain material milestones people dream about: buying a car, a ring, a home, and then perhaps a watch. Those things are nice, but for most New Yorkers they are hysterical impossibilities.
The attainable essentials are probably an MTA card, a canvas tote, a bottle of orange wine, and a pair of jeans that can help you acquire a job, meet friends, attract a partner, procreate, experience family, or simply have a funeral attended by a couple warm bodies one day.
If you file a W2, have a boss, work in an office, etc. you have to have a pair of jeans with a cut that is office appropriate and transitions seamlessly to having a Little Gem Salad or you simply cannot function and the most reliable do-everything denim is absolutely the APC Petit Standard.
My ass is too fat for this cut, which is why I still wear NBA Jeans.
But I also have multiple assault charges and have not always been a positive contributing member of society so City Leadership need not consider me when formulating policy.
I’m what you would call an “outlier”.
But back to the Petit Standard.
In 2017, these jeans retailed for about $185. With inflation, the retail price has risen to $295 and most people are going to die because they can no longer afford these jeans.
If I had to boil down a democratic global capitalist government’s function in 2025, it would be to maintain access to Plan B, abortions, and the equality of opportunity to procure work that can afford you APC Petit Standard Jeans.
When a democratic government engaged in global capitalism falls below that standard, people are going to entertain socialist ideas because you simply cannot survive without selvedge denim.
I thought this was understood and accepted.
No one is going to pull the plug on a democratic global capitalist regime because they can’t afford homes. No one would trade the opportunity to feel like a winner and bask in delusions of trickle down success simply because they cannot afford an engagement ring to marry someone they love. But if the populous cannot afford pants, my friend, they are going to consider pulling the plug.
That’s why the last week of reactions to Zohran’s victory have been so hilarious.
It ranges from billionaires threatening to leave New York to people in group chats calling Zohran voters Communists or worse, anti-semitic.
There is nothing inherently sinister about voting for Zohran that warrants this much vitriol unless you are a person who has rigged a democratic system through campaign donations and backdoor dealings because you want to be the only person who can afford selvedge denim.
In that case, I understand why you hate a representative like Zohran rising to power because he has pledged to return the opportunity to procure work to purchase selvedge denim to the people.
But if rich people hadn’t kept it so fucking tight pressing everyone else down, people would still believe they had a shot at winning in a free market with less government control because that’s the allure of capitalism. People need to feel like they can win, they can get rich, and that they can buy many many pairs of APC Petit Standard Jeans.
That is the bare minimum.
It’s not like I’m saying that watches and jet skis are fundamental human rights. I can acknowledge that a jet ski is a bit rich, a touch vulgar, and also probably anti-semitic.
But if your society cannot afford a pair of APC Petit Standard Jeans at $295, people are going to vote for socialism and you cannot fault them.
It’s not because they love socialism.
Most people don’t even know what it means and in actual practice, it’s always mixed. For instance, universal healthcare is a socialist idea that many American politicians have proposed, so is universal basic income or state owned transportation.
Aspects of socialism have worked in many ways around the world and if it works in New York, you too can purchase APC Jeans or a similar state sponsored version very very soon.
People say that Socialism hasn’t worked, but that is an outright lie.
When people give examples of places where socialism has failed, there’s usually a trail of American sabotage accompanying it like the Vietnam War, the Korean War, Iran Contra, embargo of Cuba, the Bay of Pigs, and according to Josiah Mayberry, America has intervened militaristically 469 times to thwart Socialist governments around the world.
Here’s a pathetic rant from Cameron Winklevoss who basically states that the mistake rich people made was becoming too comfortable and forgetting to protect the system that has made them rich and powerful in the first place.
Cameron Winklevoss is patently wrong.
Wealthy people absolutely maintained control of a corrupt democratic system that installed and kept them the winners every time around through Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, a 2010 ruling that declared corporations and unions have the same First Amendment free speech rights as individuals allowing them to donate unlimited amounts of money for political purposes.
There is one reason and one reason only that New Yorkers voted for Zohran: APC Petit Standard Jeans got too expensive.
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Reading this while wearing my APC Petit Standard Jeans I bought in 2019 with my first paycheck out of college that still breaking em 6 years later (I put em on ice every few months iykyk).
Patiently waiting to see the policies Zohran places while I wait for the day I can order another Aperol Spritz.
Until then, I’ll just have to be patient for my Gazebo Resy on July 10 🫡
Brilliant, as ever.