Scroogenomics: Christmas Destroys Wealth
According to Economist Joel Waldfogel, Christmas costs Americans a total of $25 billion annually:
Mr. Waldfogel estimates that Americans drop close to $70 billion a year on Christmas shopping for gifts people often don’t want … baggy underwear, ugly sweaters, etc. Society, he says in the book, would be better off if people didn’t spend it.
“Throughout the year, we shop meticulously for ourselves, looking at scores of items before choosing those that warrant spending our own money. The process at Christmas, by contrast, has givers shooting in the dark about what you like… to make matters worse, we do much of this spending with credit, going into hock using money we don’t yet have to buy things that recipients don’t really want.”
He says the deadweight loss to society from all of this frivolous spending — an “orgy of wealth destruction” as he calls it — is about $25 billion.