How the pandemic affects the fashion

A recession is a period of economic decline spread across the economy that occurs more often than you may think. Here's why and how they happen.

 heightened a shift toward the secondhand clothing market among Gen Z. While both generations shop in both markets, each served as the trendsetters during the economic downturns they came of age in.

In her new book, "Dress Code: Unlocking Fashion From the New Look to Millennial Pink," Elle fashion features director Véronique Hyland explores how fast fashion emerged as the norm for millennial shoppers in the post-Great Recession era.

"'High-low' became first a personal style directive, and then more of an order, for strivers," she wrote, and went on to explain the term. "Millennial women, who entered the workforce during a recession, were advised to mimic a proper professional appearance by mixing fast-fashion items, often runway knockoffs, with 'investment pieces' at a time when investments of all kinds felt precarious.