Prestige inflation

One of our commercial farms on the edge of town is having a contest, and the winners will receive free VIP passes to the "Haunted Nights" corn maze.  What kinds of advantages do Very Important People get at a Halloween corn maze?  Taller corn? Scarier witches? Creepier ghosts?  

     Of course, you don't have to win a contest to become a VIP these days.  You can pay money and become one instantly!   At the Glass Cactus Club in Grapevine, Texas, you can buy a VIP membership and get 'exclusive privileges'.  At many concerts, you can get VIP seating.  (We used to just call that "buying expensive, good seats" -- like the time my mother splurged on tickets to an Artur Rubinstein recital in Houston.  But we didn't become Very Important when we bought them.)  You can pay for VIP memberships in some online gaming club that will "allow you to buy more Builders, more training slots for Heroes, more Rare tokens and more MCUs" -- whatever that means.  .    
      If you're not in the mood to be a VIP, you can be elite instead.  In Austin you can avail yourself of Elite plastering, Elite janitorial services, and Elite carpet care.  You can even get "Elite Austin" to "stage" a house for you -- whatever that means.
     You can also enter the glittery world of jewels and precious metals -- Hyatt sells Gold passports, the Hilton offers Diamond Elite membership.  Costco sells an "Executive Gold Star membership". (I am not an executive and I don't own any gold, but for $100 a year I could carry a card that implies otherwise.)   United Airlines designates its frequent-spender levels as Silver Elite, Gold Elite, and Platinum Elite.  It even allows the select few to tread upon a red carpet throw-rug as they enter the jetway; here's a picture of one of 'em.  But American Airlines does United one better by invoking jewels and precious metals: "Emerald AAdvantage Executive Platinum", "Sapphire AAdvantage Platinum" and "Ruby AAdvantage Gold."  

     I must admit that I have acquired a bit of a taste for luxury in recent years, and was secretly thrilled to be bumped up to "Business Class" for a 12-hour flight (I really ate it up -- I mean, they offered food non-stop and I ate all of it!).  And there must be a part of me that wants to walk on red carpets and considered a VIP.  But haven't we gone too far with this? I'm a little embarrassed that we citizens of the richest nation in the world can be so attracted to even more trappings of wealth than we already have.
    OK.  Thus ends my stinging indictment of 21st-century American materialist culture.  I gotta run -- my Toyota is dirty and I'm off to the Elite Car Bath.