Cosmetic procedures in the US

China's box office and America's cosmetic procedures move in close formation, which is a fact that will keep a mid-career social scientist occupied for several unhelpful afternoons. One suspects the common variable is the mirror and the movie screen both being covered in dust.

Both moved sharply in 2020 for covid reasons. Chinese box office collapsed as theatres closed nationwide under early and strict lockdowns, while US cosmetic procedures surged after an initial 2020 drop as Zoom-face anxiety, lockdown savings, and pent-up demand drove procedures to new highs. Two very different screens — one public, one personal — both reshaped by the same virus.

So the correlation is a strange little parallel about images of the self. One screen went dark; the other was studied for hours. The virus, somehow, fed both.