Melania Trump Wears $51,000 Dolce & Gabbana Jacket in Sicily

No, that price was not a typo.
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US First Lady Melania Trump arrives for a visit at the Chierici Palace City Hall of Catania on the sidelines of a G7 summit of the Heads of State and of Government in Taormina, on May 26, 2017 in Sicily.The leaders of Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, the US and Italy will be joined by representatives of the European Union and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) as well as teams from Ethiopia, Kenya, Niger, Nigeria and Tunisia during the summit from May 26 to 27, 2017. / AFP PHOTO / GIOVANNI ISOLINO (Photo credit should read GIOVANNI ISOLINO/AFP/Getty Images)GIOVANNI ISOLINO

ICYMI, First Lady Melania Trump stepped out in Sicily for the G7 Summit wearing a $51,500 Dolce & Gabbana floral jacket. Yes, you read that right — a jacket that costs $51,500.

It’s not the first time Melania’s been put in the hot seat over costs associated with her lifestyle and her background. When her official White House portrait was unveiled, criticisms arose over the fact she was wearing a $3 million, 25-carat ring in the portrait. Let’s also not forget her poorly-received Vanity Fair Mexico cover, that featured an old photo where she was twirling expensive jewelry like spaghetti on a spoon while beaming for the camera. And, New York City Police Commissioner James P. O’Neill estimated that it cost a whopping $24 million to provide security for the Trumps in the time between the election and the inauguration — a number inflated by the First Lady’s decision to stay in Trump Tower in New York City.

Alas, this little jacket feels like another outright flaunt of the extreme wealth Melania gets to indulge in daily while her husband’s policies affect constituents who worry about the cost of their healthcare or where they will obtain clean drinking water feels like a slap in the face.

As many media outlets have pointed out already, Melania’s jacket costs more than the average American yearly salary. In 2016, the US Census Bureau reported that the median yearly household income in 2015 was $56,516, which would barely cover the cost of the jacket (before tax).

But, the story doesn’t end there! That figure doesn’t take in other factors that contribute to income, like race and gender. Data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics in April 2017 found that women or women-identifying people still earn, on average, 80.5% of what men or male-identifying people do when you break down their wages by week. (The data did not account for people who are non-binary or whose gender does not fall in line with the gender binary. But according to one study, salaries of transgender women fell from their already unequal rates by as much as one-third.) In the first quarter of 2017, white women earned a reported average of $790 per week, black women earned $645, and Latinx women earned $596. That means it would take each woman well over a year to earn the funds necessary for the jacket..if they spent their money on literally nothing else. The group who would hit the required number soonest? Asian women, who earned a reported average of $892 a week, would earn $51,500 in 57.7 weeks.

There has been a long legacy of scrutinizing women in the political space for their sartorial choices. During her campaign, Hillary Clinton came under fire for sporting an Armani jacket that allegedly cost somewhere between $7,000 and $13,000. The Cut pointed out that Michelle Obama was regularly criticized for her wardrobe, particularly for a pair of $540 Lanvin sneakers. It’s perhaps worth noting that, in 2014, Mrs. Obama’s press secretary said that the then-First Lady paid for her clothing, and for “official events of public or historic significance,” designers gifted her gowns which were later stored in the National Archives.

Of course, reactions are mixed on social media, most prominently on Twitter.

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Of course, Melania is well within her right to wear what she wants, and to spend what she wants on her wardrobe. And it’s highly likely that Melania was actually gifted or loaned the jacket in question. Stefano Gabbana, one-half of Dolce & Gabbana’s design team, has been posting pictures of Mrs. Trump’s outfits on his Instagram accompanied by fawning comments. Mr. Gabbana, of course, is no stranger to controversy himself — he’s previously come under fire for his outspoken support of the Trumps, homophobic comments about parenting, and cultural appropriation on the runways.

Related: Equal Pay For Women Won't Happen Until the 23rd Century, Study Says

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