The most common version of the theory is that skirt lengths get shorter in good economic times (1920s, 1960s)[1] and longer in bad, such as after the 1929 Wall Street crash.
However, the reverse has also been proposed with longer skirts signaling prosperity (1950s).
[2] The theory is often incorrectly attributed to economist George Taylor in 1926.
[3][4] Taylor's 1929 thesis Significant post-war changes in the full-fashioned hosiery industry, which identified skirt length as one factor that led to explosive growth in the hosiery industry during the 1920s, did not propose a hemline theory.
[5] Non-peer-reviewed research in 2010 supported the correlation, suggesting that "the economic cycle leads the hemline with about three years".