That was a preposterously large sum when this collection of magazine pieces appeared in the late Seventies, though even then there were more than a few who failed to see the humor in it. Today, it's become less and less funny even to the middle class, who may, in a two-income family in a high-cost locale, be bumping up into just such straitened circumstances.

This book has long been out of print, though I borrowed a few of its better passages for a later book, MY VAST FORTUNE.