Once upon a time one’s social status was clearly signaled by so many things: fragile expensive clothes, skin not worn from work, accent, vocabulary, and so on. As many of these signal have weakened, one remains strong: tantrums.

CEOs throw more tantrums than mailboys. Similarly movie stars, sports stars, and politicians throw more tantrums than ordinary people in those industries. Also famous for their tantrums: spoiled young wives, bigshot patriarchs, elite travelers, and toddlers.

These patterns make sense: after all, beautiful young women and successful older men are at their peak of desirability to the opposite sex. If you are surprised that toddlers make the list, perhaps you should pay closer attention to the toddler-parent relation. Parents mostly serve toddlers, not the other way around.

Of course, like a swagger, the signal is not so much the tantum itself as the fact that someone can get away with it.

Addendum: Todd Kendall has a data paper on this for NBA players.