Gifts This Season

2007 November 29
by Kelly

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M4j1paMC5SM&rel=1]

If you’re planning on buying the 364 items in “The Twelve Days of Christmas” this year, it’s going to cost you.

According to the annual PNC Christmas Price Index (aren’t you glad such a thing exists?), it will cost $78,100 to buy the 364 items, up 4% from last year. That includes the repetitions in the song (for example), a partridge in a pear tree is mentioned twelve times. If you merely want to buy each item once, it will cost $19,507.

Adding to the cost is the minimum wage hike, which bumped the cost of eight maids a-milking from about $41 to nearly $47, and the rising cost of foods, increasing the cost of six geese a-laying from $300 to $360. Five gold rings will now cost $395.

Ringing in lower this year is the cost of a partridge, which runs $15 without a pear tree. The complete list:

Partridge ($15) in a Pear Tree ($164.99)
Two turtle doves ($40)
Three French hens ($45)
Four calling birds ($599.96)
Five gold rings ($395)
Six geese a-laying ($360)
Seven swans a-swimming ($4,200)
Eight maids a-milking ($46.80)
Nine ladies dancing ($4,759)
Ten lords a-leaping ($4,285.06)
Eleven pipers piping ($2,213.40)
Twelve drummers drumming ($2,397.85)

And yes, these are all pre-tax figures. More on the tax consequences of buying for your true love later…

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2007 November 29
Jim Newhard, CPA

As a tax and financial advisor, my thoughts go to two questions/thoughts:
1) To purchase all of these things, shouldn’t we factor in the home upgrade required to house and a barn/mini-bird sanctuary for an additional 48 people and 22 birds? Then there is the zoning issues, the potential noise violations, the soil and light considerations of a pear tree, not to mention the cost of feeding all these people and animals! And last but not leaset, there’s the interest costs on the physical structure (additional mortgage — hopefully qualifying interest and suffient tax income to utilize the huge interest write-off assuming of course the individual is not socked by AMT)!

2) Wouldn’t it be cheaper just to lease these 12 things???

just thinking…

2007 November 29
All I Want For Christmas…

[...] up on my post about the 12 Days of Christmas, which of the gifts would you most [...]

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2007 November 29
Kelly

Excellent points, Jim.
And then there is the extra help required to take care of all of them…

2007 November 29
Maddy

Another issue to think about is that the 12 days of Christmas begin on December 25th - so, for all subsequent days, you may be able to get some post-Christmas bargains. Now, the milkmaids may require some “holiday pay” because their first “gig” is scheduled for January 1st, which is a national holiday - and do you already have the cows, or are they provided by the maids - who gets the milk? Finally, all of the “performance” gifts fall after New Years Day - which is, generally, a down time for performing artists - so you may be able to get a bargain.

2007 November 29
Kelly

Excellent considerations.
Though - are there going to be many geese still about fit for laying after the holidays? Those Brits eat a lot of Christmas goose, no?

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