(C) Daily Kos
This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered.
. . . . . . . . . .
Top Comments: Seasonal 2023 Part III (Cost of the12 Days Of Christmas) Edition [1]
['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']
Date: 2023-12-18
We started off 2023 with thoughts on decorations , and then chatted about Nativities and Menorahs . As I mentioned above, I really do have a spreadsheet to track the topics I’ve covered over the years. I’ve written *46* of them as of last week, after all! Imagine my shock when I went back to find my previous incarnation of this diary so I could update it and it did not exist. I was 100% sure I’d covered the 12 Days of Christmas before, but it looks like the only time I did so was to use it as a basis for a musical diary . OK then, here we go...
It’s time to do it again here in Let’s Go With This Is The New Normal 2023! While my personal December perspective is primarily secular but culturally Christian-based with a healthy mix of Winter Solstice and Unitarian Universalism, these diaries are for everyone who celebrates a holiday in December that makes you happy, that you mark differently than all the other days, or that involves negotiating who brings what food where… or even if there isn’t... this is a place for you and I really hope you’ll bring yourself to the comments!
Every year since 2010 I’ve done a series of December diaries focusing on a variety of seasonal topics ranging from music to food to ugly sweaters. (Full disclosure: I did ONE Seasonal diary in 2008, and 2009 was the first December K2 was with us (exactly fourteen years ago we were packing to return home from Ethiopia with him) so I was a little distracted :-)). You can find them all, tagged with #seasonal , and yes I have a spreadsheet so I know what topics I’ve done recently!
The Twelve Days of Christmas is the celebratory period between Christmas Day and Twelfth Night aka Epiphany Eve in Western Christianity, first proclaimed at the Council of Tours in 567CE. However, what I am utterly sure was your FIRST thought was the carol of the same name. A nineteenth century song based on eighteenth century children’s book based on things lost to the mists of time has given us one of the most popular Christmas songs ever.
The lyrics have changed over the years and geographically (see the Wikipedia article for a fascinating chart!) but generally are sung as follows:
Day 1: A partridge in a pear tree
Day 2: Two turtle doves
Day 3: Three French hens
Day 4: Four calling birds
Day 5: Five golden rings
Day 6: Six geese a-laying
Day 7: Seven swans a-swimming
Day 8: Eight maids a-milking
Day 9: Nine ladies dancing
Day 10: 10 lords a-leaping
Day 11: 11 pipers piping
Day 12: 12 drummers drumming
I suspect that just like me, you wonder sometimes exactly how much cash that Purveyor of Gifts for their True Love is shelling out for those 78 items in The List (lyrical purists hold that thought, I gotcha later on). Well, I now know that PNC Bank has calculated the cost of all those gifts and has done so for the past forty years! From the PNC Christmas Price Index:
It all started 40 years ago at a PNC predecessor bank in Philadelphia as a way to engage clients during the traditionally light holiday weeks. What hatched as the creative brainchild of the bank’s then-chief economist has since grown into one of PNC’s most popular and anticipated economic reports. Over the years, trends have emerged, and the PNC Christmas Price Index® (PNC CPI) has often increased or decreased at a rate consistent with the U.S. Consumer Price Index, a measure of inflation produced by the U.S. Department of Labor.
The 2023 PNC estimate of the Cost of Christmas Gifts is $46,729.86. The 2022 estimate was $45,523.27, while in 1984 (the first year PNC calculated) the total was $20,069.58. Not bad for 40 years, in my opinion. With the help of PNC and also the writeup Forbes did based on the PNC CPI, let’s breakdown what those gifts are costing, and why:
Gift 1: $319.18 While the Partridge cost about the same as last year ($20), the cost of housing it (the Pear Tree) rose by 15%. Next year may be less if the Tree is turned into market rate condos and the Partridge is left treeless.
Gift 2: $750 Holy crap, Two Turtle Doves are rare and therefore expensive! They jumped by $150 since last year! Maybe breed those birds and keep the chicks for next year?
Gift 3: $330 At $110 per bird, Three French Hens are relatively inexpensive! Only $12 more than last year.
Gift 4: $599.96 The price of Four Calling Birds has only risen 8 times in 40 years. Pretty stable, those birds!
Gift 5: $1245 This is the year to buy gold rings… the price stayed the same! Weddings, anyone?
Gift 6: $780 The price of Six Geese-a-Laying rose by only $10 per goose from last year, but they’re $500 more than in 2018. I have no idea why given how many freekin geese I see everywhere. They should be like chickens, ffs.
Gift 7: $13125 The good news is Seven Swans-a-Swimming are the same price as last year. The bad news is, well, look at the cost of swans. Again, I see at least two swans on every body of water in Massachusetts so really, is it that hard to get swans?!
Gift 8: $58 No, I didn’t typo that. The Eight Maids-a-Milking are paid Federal Minimum wage. That’s all they made last year, too. The Maids need a union, stat!
Gift 9: $8,308.12 The Nine Ladies Dancing made the same as last year. I hope they (and all our performers!) comped the Maids tickets to their performance.
Gift 10: $14,539.20 Surprising literally no one, Ten Lords-a-Leaping are the most expensive gift on the list. Let’s hear it again for Rich (probably White) Men who probably blame the economic situation on the Maids, because of course they would.
Gift 11: $3,207.38 Our performers really need a union, because our Eleven Pipers Piping are making only 6% more than last year. Still better than the Maids. Yes, I’m a little shocked at the Maids. TIP YOUR MAIDS, PEOPLE!!
Gift 12: $3,468.02 The Twelve Drummers Drumming are making about as much more as the Pipers and Dancing Ladies did. Underpaid compared to the #$%^ing Lords, but more than the Maids.
BUT BRILLIG, WHAT ABOUT THE CUMULATIVE NATURE OF THE SONG??!!!
Did I not tell you I had you covered? If you are a lyrical purist (or really, REALLY need to impress your True Love for whatever reasons that I am NOT asking about), Forbes calculated that getting all 364 gifts will set our purchaser back a whopping $201,972.66, apparently the first time it crossed the $200,000 threshold.
And lastly, a fun fact from that same Forbes article:
Buying all 12 gifts online costs 4.8% more than in 2022 for a price tag of $52,024.03. The convenience of shopping from home is still impacted by elevated shipping and packaging costs that have yet to ease since the pandemic.
Before I turn this diary over to the Tops, my favorite version of this song. Come talk Christmas Gifts and Music in the comments with me!
[END]
---
[1] Url:
https://dailykos.com/stories/2023/12/18/2212503/-Top-Comments-Seasonal-2023-Part-III-Cost-of-the12-Days-Of-Christmas-Edition?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=more_community&pm_medium=web
Published and (C) by Daily Kos
Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified.
via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds:
gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/
