Peak pleasure: The tony town of Aspen is a (rich) kid’s heaven on earth

Two kids, boys about 10 years old, walk past the bar to the hostess stand of a popular restaurant in Aspen, Colo. “We’d like a table for two,” one says. The waitress doesn’t blink; she leads them to a booth.

The mountain town of Aspen isn’t just a gnarly spot of X Games sports, or a seventh home location for the world’s most rapaciously successful accumulators of capital (the median price of a single-family home hovers around $13 million). It’s also become a playground for . . . children. Very rich children, yes, but that isn’t their fault.

The pretty, pedestrian-friendly downtown, girt by gingerbread houses, is just five blocks...