Life was long patently unfair. In general, only the well-off were extended credit, permitted to live above their station, then plummet into a shame spiral of swampy debt.

Today, economic land mines are available to everyone. All are welcome to tap-dance above their means.

Consequently, many Americans are engaged in a death match of acquisition, spending inordinate amounts of capital on “show,” eye-catching displays of consumption signifying they’ve arrived even if, in reality, they’re only rushing by the drive-through.

If one can’t buy, one acquires temporarily – cars, homes and, if the behavior wasn’t obvious enough, handbags.

We’re living on borrowed goods.

Among the avalanche of holiday catalogs was one for Bag Borrow or Steal, the Web venture (bagborroworsteal.com) for borrowing handbags and jewelry, because nothing quite says Christmas like a fleeting time-share on a Gucci Bouvier Hobo.

For a $60-a-year member, the bag rents for $175 a month or $60 a week, plus a $10 shipping fee. That’s quite an expenditure for a transitory fashion statement. If you wanted to truly commit to the Gucci, instead of engaging in a 31-night stand, the cost is $970 or 5 months’ rental.

Handbags, as I’ve observed before, have become highly politicized objects of lust, status and scorn. The more expensive models are festooned with buckles, belts and chains like heavy artillery or body armor, which, in a sense, they’ve become.

The symbolism is obvious in our nominally casual culture. Handbags are the currency to style, wealth and prestige. We may all be sporting jeans and sneakers, but the handbag – the object safeguarding the keys, cash and credit – is the lodestar of tax brackets, though not necessarily class.

Just to emphasize such distinctions, Bag Borrow or Steal sorts handbags into four collections: Trendsetter ($), Princess ($$), Diva ($$$) and Couture ($$$$). Such categories sing arias when self-willed divas are more expensive and higher in cachet than princesses, who are to the behavior raised, their hearts – to say nothing of their plastic – belonging to Daddy.

What does it mean to be constantly peering through the shop window of luxury, always a renter, never an owner of these ubiquitous objects of desire? On the one shoulder, it’s a nice egalitarian notion that anyone can carry a quilted Chanel handbag, if only for $95 a week. On the other, it’s one more way of playing a game few will ever win, risking more noble goals while validating questionable ideals.

I’m not immune to some handbags’ beauty, the allure of Italian craftsmanship, though it seems absurd that some cost more than winter coats when there’s no shortage of leather.

The absurdity is that in the pursuit of appearing successful, many women – and some men, too – keep themselves from achieving that success, all by expending capital on the irresistible now.

Not that this is new. Decades ago, some women dressed beyond their means – a month’s salary for a dress is mentioned in many vintage movies – in order to catch a prosperous man. Today, women flourish by means other than accessories. Most men, at least those one is likely to date, can’t distinguish between this season’s Prada and last year’s Coach.

So why maintain a Bag Borrow or Steal’s $1,260-a-year Diva lifestyle with not one Gucci Hobo to call your own? To compete with other women, to keep up with magazines geared to make us buy more, to invest in a solitary view of what rules as style and success?

It’s a leased life, with more objects available for rental soon. For some women, those handbags are literally weighing them down, holding them back. The Hobo, while not immediately conferring such status, carries a leathery whiff of irony.

Karen Heller is a columnist for The Philadelphia Inquirer.