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Emile comments on A Rational Approach to Fashion - Less Wrong
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I recently (successfully) applied for a job at a fashion company, doing technical back-end stuff. My invitation to interview said "just wear what you're comfortable in". On the basis that they probably didn't want me turning up in my underpants and slippers I wore a suit.
I've always considered the business attire interview convention to be a very useful protocol, and actually found it a bit discourteous when they tried to take it away from me. Business attire might be considered conventionally high status, but it also sets a bounded limit on how good or bad applicants can look. If they're going to be judged based on their clothing, at least they're being judged on a scale which is common knowledge. Once you remove that protocol, you have no idea what you're competing against.
I actually asked the panel interviewing me what they all wore to their interviews with the company, and every one of them went for formal business attire.
I agree, it's not the same as say wearing designer clothes in high school, which would be closer to a prisoner's dilemma - and in that case one way to enforce "cooperation" is to make wearing a uniform compulsory.
(except that it doesn't achieve the desired results, and makes identification and tracking of status games much harder for people outside of the loop by reducing signal visibility, without diminishing the frequency, intensity, complexity or consequences of the status games in the slightest)