# Black Friday: is there a cure? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 15, 2014, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701 "2014-11-15T17:00:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2014, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701/81 "2014-11-17T02:36:24Z")
> [@Sunspace](#): > > There _is_ a medicament for the symptoms, though. Try the Canadian solution: move Thanksgiving to early October. 🙂 In this way, Halloween insulates Thanksgiving from the hype. > > Black Friday in Canada is just a random weekday, though there is some spillover of hype from south of the border. _Our_ Crazy Holiday-Related Shopping Day is Boxing Day, Dec 26th. Yabbut, buying next year’s Christmas presents on December 26th can present its own problems. Like that year I decided to buy my nephew a puppy… ---
**Author:** ![Steve\_MB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steve_mb/32/5339_2.png) [@Steve\_MB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve_MB)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2014, 3:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701/82 "2014-11-17T03:27:59Z")
> [@Jophiel](#): > > That makes no sense. [Macys.com](http://Macys.com) is presumably operating 24/7. > > You may as well argue that every department store needs to stay open 24/7 because what if I go to [Amazon.com](http://Amazon.com) at 2am when Macy’s retail stores are closed? > [@monstro](#): > > No, I’m saying that competitive forces were different when Macy’s was able to stay closed on a holiday. The problem is that you are citing a difference that, if it relevant in the way you claim it to be relevant, clearly would require precisely the result **Jophiel** describes – a phenomenon that actually is nowhere to be seen, thus proving that the difference is not, in fact, relevant in the way you claim. ---
**Author:** ![Drunky\_Smurf](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drunky_smurf/32/449_2.png) [@Drunky\_Smurf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drunky_Smurf)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2014, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701/83 "2014-11-17T19:01:11Z")
Just don’t go shopping on Friday. It’s not that hard. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Lowry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e95f7d/32.png) [@Sam\_Lowry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Lowry)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2014, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701/84 "2014-11-17T19:14:44Z")
I am curious about how actual retail workers feel about Black Friday. Do most workers hate and dread it, or are they happy about getting paid overtime or holiday pay for it? Are the people working on Thanksgiving and Black Friday volunteers who don’t care about Thanksgiving as much, or are they forced to be there despite asking for it off and are bitter about it? If anyone knows of any surveys about this I’d like to see them. I read something recently about the Wal-Mart workers who were protesting at their stores regarding their pay but related to Black Friday, but I don’t know if that’s indicative of Wal-Mart workers everywhere or not. > [@monstro](#): > > My “middle ground” would be to focus on livable wages and predictable scheduling for retail workers. These are things that benefit families the most. Not sentimental holidays. Listening to the folks who do minimum wage jobs on reddit and such places, the biggest complaint seems to be how they never get enough hours to support themselves. Especially the ones who are having to pay rent and utilities (folks still living with parents probably have less reason to worry about stuff like this). Maybe if those folks were the main ones protesting Black Friday, I would feel differently about this whole thing. But it seems to me their voices are always drowned out by the folks who can afford to be sentimental. Overall I agree with this. I’m not thrilled with Black Friday being so crazy, and families having to interrupt their Thanksgiving because family members have to go work at the mall. But if I was going to change things for the better for retail workers, I would definitely focus on livable wages, predictable scheduling, and maybe some more labor protections. Black Friday would be further down the list. ---
**Author:** ![Doug\_K](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b5ac83/32.png) [@Doug\_K](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doug_K)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2014, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701/85 "2014-11-17T19:34:12Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > It’s understood when you take a job in retail that you’re going to have to work on the biggest retail day of the year. If that’s not acceptable to you, don’t take a retail job. And if you (or a loved one) don’t have a retail job, there’s nothing at all stopping you from ignoring Black Friday. But no one is complaining about stores opening the [Saturday before Christmas.](http://money.howstuffworks.com/black-friday-shopping1.htm) ---
**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [November 17, 2014, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701/86 "2014-11-17T20:06:34Z")
It feels like ‘Black Friday’ has become like box office grosses. People, especially business people, love stats. You can compare this years Black Friday sales to last years. You can forecast all Christmas sales from your Black Friday stats. And the push to have a bigger ‘opening weekend’ is greater and greater. Just like how some big movies open on Thursday or even Wednesday to try and boost their ‘opening weekend’, black Friday has this sort of mission creep. There is no cure for this. ---
**Author:** ![Tread](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/53a042/32.png) [@Tread](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tread)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2014, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701/87 "2014-11-18T04:00:15Z")
[quote=“monstro, post:20, topic:704701”] I have a friend who’s wife is an ER doctor. She has to work on Thanksgiving. So does my brother, the truck driver. I will be surfing the web and watching TV sometime during Thanksgiving. Are robots running those things, or are people? I’m thinking it’s people. Lots of folks work on Thanksgiving and no one cares about them. Why should the Walmart cashier who WANTS holiday pay be fretted over, but not anyone else?/QUOTE] And I will be producing Electricity for you to enjoy the day. If everyone would throw their disconnects to their homes, and businesses, I too could have the day off, but nooooo everyone wants their precious electricity. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Declan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecae2f/32.png) [@Declan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Declan)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2014, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701/88 "2014-11-18T17:53:53Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#): > > Yabbut, buying next year’s Christmas presents on December 26th can present its own problems. > > Like that year I decided to buy my nephew a puppy… BF has made its way to Canada, or at the very least the trailing edges of the phenom. It used to be that Boxing day was the sole consumer day, with the best prices and such. But Canadian retailers , at least in Ontario, are being pressured by folks that make the trip stateside for the BF deals. A tv or what ever is just the same, no matter what side of the border you buy it on, but on the American side, its a loss for a Canadian vendor. It would be facinating to see the lost time report, for industry, in regards to BF as unlike the States, there is no associated holiday on that weekend. So you might have walmart employees skipping work on the Canadian side, to shop in the same brand name store on the American side. Declan ---
**Author:** ![alexandra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e68b1a/32.png) [@alexandra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alexandra)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2014, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701/89 "2014-11-18T18:14:50Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > **LibrarySpy** , I hadn’t even considered the class angle to all this, but you’re right. The sanctimony does seem to come from a place of privilege. People working like dogs on holidays has always existed, but to let some people tell it, it’s a brand new thing. I can only guess that their concern comes from seeing their own children working like dogs. It’s only meaningful and “emblematic” if it’s happening to your family. I dunno. Seems from my (admittedly not terribly knowledgeable) perspective that shops being open on a holiday will disrupt the family time of a low-income retail worker far more than the middle-class office worker. It is a class issue, but not in the way that you see it, IMO. I do see your point about sexism and unpaid female labour, but…isn’t it possible to address that without losing time spent with your loved ones? Or even just a protected day off work? US employees have such meagre holiday time as it is. In the UK the vast majority of shops are closed on Christmas, but, as noted in this thread, some people do have to work (nurses, doctors, etc). However, as it’s a bank holiday you would get that day off another time, and certainly NHS healthcare professionals get extra pay on top of that. Does none of this apply to those working on Thanksgiving in the US? ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2014, 7:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701/90 "2014-11-18T19:28:40Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > I’m lucky enough to work in a job where my contract says I get a full day’s pay for Thanksgiving whether I work it or not, plus time-and-a-half on top of that for any hours I do work on the day itself. > > Perhaps if more employers had to adhere to terms like that, they’d think twice about dragging their minimum-wage-slaves away from their families at 6 PM. No they wouldn’t. The ‘double time and a half’ for working on a paid holiday is sleight-of-hand, and doesn’t actually give you any greater benefit (or your employer any greater disincentive) than working overtime on any other day. The only benefit is from the paid holiday itself, which is paid whether you work on it or not. I’m gonna put this in Monday-through-Friday terms, but I’m sure you can adjust it to a retail worker’s schedule, or anyone else’s. Suppose I work 8 hours a day, Monday through Friday. But Thanksgiving’s a paid holiday. I’m already getting paid for Thanksgiving, whether I work on it or not. 5 days’ pay for 4 days’ work. If my employer has me work on Thanksgiving, under your scenario, I get paid time and a half in addition to my holiday pay. But the same would be true if I had to work on Saturday instead: I’d get paid time and a half then. Either way, I’d work 5 days, and get 6.5 days’ pay. So there’d be no more disincentive for my employer to ask me to work on Thanksgiving than to ask me to work on Saturday. And no more benefit for me, either. Which seems silly, because most of us would place a greater premium on having Thanksgiving free than having Saturday free. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2014, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701/91 "2014-11-18T19:33:24Z")
> [@alexandra](#): > > In the UK the vast majority of shops are closed on Christmas, but, as noted in this thread, some people do have to work (nurses, doctors, etc). However, as it’s a bank holiday you would get that day off another time, and certainly NHS healthcare professionals get extra pay on top of that. Does none of this apply to those working on Thanksgiving in the US? I’m not well-versed in labor law, but AFAIK in the U.S., there’s no requirement for employers to give paid holidays, just like there’s no requirement for employers to give paid vacation or sick leave. I agree, it’s barbaric. ---
**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2014, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701/92 "2014-11-18T21:12:24Z")
Be grateful you have job! That’s our labor law. ---
**Author:** ![Justin\_Bailey](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/justin_bailey/32/8792_2.png) [@Justin\_Bailey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Justin_Bailey)\ **Post date:** [November 18, 2014, 9:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701/93 "2014-11-18T21:56:12Z")
> [@Declan](#): > > It would be facinating to see the lost time report, for industry, in regards to BF as unlike the States, there is no associated holiday on that weekend. So you might have walmart employees skipping work on the Canadian side, to shop in the same brand name store on the American side. There’s no associated holiday on the weekend in the US either. Businesses that give the day off for Thanksgiving expect most people back at work bright and early on Friday morning. We did a poll around here last year showing that and even in light of the numbers, some people still believed that the entire US was eating turkey and watching football for a four-day weekend. [Found It!](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=586865) 65% had to work on Friday, 35% had the day off ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2014, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701/94 "2014-11-19T22:14:51Z")
I agree with those who think this is a classist sort of complaint. My former job was in manufacturing, not retail, but we also were open on Thanksgiving. We worked with glass furnaces which had to be fed glass constantly, so shutting down was not feasible. Some people wanted to work that day. Some people hated to work that day. Those working that day got paid for the day plus any shift differential plus double time holiday pay. Those not working got straight time holiday pay. Lots thought that was a good trade. For me, I hate the idea of enforcing a single standard for how we should celebrate holidays, or how we should interact as families, or how we should live as people. ---
**Author:** ![CrazyCatLady](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/dfb087/32.png) [@CrazyCatLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CrazyCatLady)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2014, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701/95 "2014-11-20T02:24:03Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > Also, it’s not Target or Macys doesn’t have a website. The whole “competing with Amazon” may be a factor, but they aren’t only a brick and mortar store. Perhaps they can offer a special discount to Thanksgiving sales online? They already do. Well, not special online discounts, exactly. Just most of the same deals you could get in the store. The super-crazy “we only have five in the store” deals aren’t usually online, but the other stuff? Sometimes it’s available Wednesday night. I do a lot of Black Friday sale shopping on Thursday night, but it’s all at home in my underpants. ---
**Author:** ![Spiderman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spiderman/32/230_2.png) [@Spiderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiderman)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2014, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701/96 "2014-11-20T02:50:36Z")
> [@RTFirefly](#): > > No they wouldn’t. The ‘double time and a half’ for working on a paid holiday is sleight-of-hand, and doesn’t actually give you any greater benefit (or your employer any greater disincentive) than working overtime on any other day. The only benefit is from the paid holiday itself, which is paid whether you work on it or not. > > I’m gonna put this in Monday-through-Friday terms, but I’m sure you can adjust it to a retail worker’s schedule, or anyone else’s. > > Suppose I work 8 hours a day, Monday through Friday. But Thanksgiving’s a paid holiday. I’m already getting paid for Thanksgiving, whether I work on it or not. 5 days’ pay for 4 days’ work. > > If my employer has me work on Thanksgiving, under your scenario, I get paid time and a half in addition to my holiday pay. But the same would be true if I had to work on Saturday instead: I’d get paid time and a half then. > > Either way, I’d work 5 days, and get 6.5 days’ pay. So there’d be no more disincentive for my employer to ask me to work on Thanksgiving than to ask me to work on Saturday. And no more benefit for me, either. > > Which seems silly, because most of us would place a greater premium on having Thanksgiving free than having Saturday free. Not true, you don’t get OT until you work 40 hrs. If you work 4 days of M-F + 1 vacation/holiday/sick day & then work on Sat, the Sat time is straight time, not 1½ regular wages. > [@monstro](#): > > When Macy’s stayed closed on Thanksgiving for all those “years and years”, were they competing against online stores? Because I can imagine there was a time when Macy’s could easily afford to miss a day of sales. That time is not now. While the _stores_ have only been open 2 or 3 years now, don’t forget that Macy’s employees have worked the past [88 years](http://social.macys.com/parade/) on Thanksgiving. ---
**Author:** ![HeyHomie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/heyhomie/32/207_2.png) [@HeyHomie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HeyHomie)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2014, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701/97 "2014-11-20T18:59:25Z")
I steadfastly refuse to have anything to do with Black Friday and/or big-box retailers and their “holiday” sales. What little Christmas shopping I do, I do either online, at local businesses, or long enough after Thanksgiving to be irrelevant to the Black Friday nonsense. ---
**Author:** ![That\_Don\_Guy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/that_don_guy/32/538_2.png) [@That\_Don\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/That_Don_Guy)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2014, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701/98 "2014-11-20T19:27:18Z")
I don’t think Thanksgiving _per se_ is going anywhere; it will always be on the fourth Thursday in November. Keep in mind that this is a relatively recent thing. (Wasn’t there a time in the 1940s or so when the Democrats celebrated it on one day and the Republicans on another?) The parade and football games will help keep the tradition of “Thanksgiving dinner” on that particular day going. But also, the tradition of “black Friday” has been around for decades as well. As far as I know, the reason Santa Claus is always at the end of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade is to “signal the start of the Christmas shopping season”. I assume Macy’s at Herald Square always opens its “Visit Santa” section the next day. The only thing “missing” is for Black Friday to be declared a national holiday, the way Canada (for example) does with Boxing Day. Considering that pretty much every public school (and, presumably, most private ones) already gives students that day off, why not? How many parents already have to take the day off just so somebody can be at home with the kids? However, if you really want to get rid of the mass panic that associates with the date, the first two things you need to do are (a) get rid of “doorbuster specials”, and (b) make sure no item that is expected to sell out fast has its initial release on that date. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/black-friday-is-there-a-cure/704701.md?page=4)