Score one for a lady with no actual career! Nicole Richie's baby photos in People are selling better than Christina Aguilera's, with the tabloid on target to move 1.8 million copies of Harlow Madden.

Meanwhile, Larry Hackett & Co. paid upwards of $2 million for Xtina's pics and sold 1.3 million copies, losing money on the issue; Nicole's are said to have cost half that with a full half million more issues moving.

So what the reverse fiscal smarts?

Because People, as the category's leader, would rather out spend the competition to score exclusive sought-after baby photos than save a few hundred thousand dollars and let them go to the competition. People knew they weren't going to sell well on the newsstand. Xtina never does — but knowingly losing money on the issue was more a a matter of keeping them away from the Us Weeklys of the world.

As for Nicole's photos? The "bargain" deal is said to have been hammered out after Christina's issue was on the newsstand.