This article examines the divergent shopping patterns for consumers located in different positions within urban China’s social hierarchy. Drawing upon detailed ethnographic data, the article argues that differentiated class positions in urban China are expressed through the practicalities of daily shopping and consumer practices that involve fundamentally different ‘problems’ of uncertainty and value in the marketplace. It is shown that questions of social inequality are central to understanding not only marketplace behaviors, but also in drawing connections between markets and cultural logics of daily life.
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