Regarding the 'looks don't matter, class does' hypothesis discussed in the article, does anyone know whether attractiveness correlates with social class? Seems like a weird thing to assume is uncorrelated.
Good looks are a function of 1) Genetics, 2) Effort, and 3) Money -- pick two.
Like, if you ain't naturally gifted it takes a bunch of time and cash (clothes, gym membership, makeup, expensive haircuts, etc.) to compensate -- but you can. Lord knows I'm a walking, talking ogre but can pull it off by putting in the effort.
But lots of effort requires the time and ability to invest the energy -- which implies money -- and then there is the literal 3) Money, which aside from clothes and makeup is also things like plastic surgery, teeth whitening, etc.