# This year you spent more/less on Christmas **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 27, 2007, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/this-year-you-spent-more-less-on-christmas/431409 "2007-12-27T21:29:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Caffeine.addict](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f475e1/32.png) [@Caffeine.addict](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Caffeine.addict)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2007, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/this-year-you-spent-more-less-on-christmas/431409/41 "2007-12-28T15:35:17Z")
Depends on how you define it. My wife and I agreed on a limit of 25.00 for each of us. My family doesn’t exchange gifts because they are in Brazil and none of us want the headache of shipping. However, the reason we put the cap was that we are buying a flat screen TV as our gift, but are waiting a while to find a good sale. ---
**Author:** ![TroubleAgain](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e480ec/32.png) [@TroubleAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TroubleAgain)\ **Post date:** [December 28, 2007, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/this-year-you-spent-more-less-on-christmas/431409/42 "2007-12-28T20:02:54Z")
Less. Significant chunks of my family are experiencing or anticipating financial hardship, so we made a pact on gift exchanges. None at all between my dad, his wife and his two adult kids and spouses. A “Yankee Swap” gift exchange at my mom’s for all the adults. And we warned his family that we’d be giving a skinnier Christmas than usual, too. Which allowed us to spend a little more on each other than we’ve typically been doing, and it still ended up being less than usual. ---
**Author:** ![Most\_Creative\_User\_Name\_Ever](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Most\_Creative\_User\_Name\_Ever](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Most_Creative_User_Name_Ever)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2007, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/this-year-you-spent-more-less-on-christmas/431409/43 "2007-12-29T00:57:04Z")
We spent about $500 less this year on Christmas for the same amount of people. Next year I hope to do homemade gifts for most of the people. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2007, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/this-year-you-spent-more-less-on-christmas/431409/44 "2007-12-29T00:58:43Z")
Much more. iPods aren’t cheap! ---
**Author:** ![Katriona](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/katriona/32/113_2.png) [@Katriona](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Katriona)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2007, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/this-year-you-spent-more-less-on-christmas/431409/45 "2007-12-29T01:36:21Z")
Less. Mr. Kat was laid off in July and is starting his own business. it was “cheap Christmas” this year. He made me the best mousepad - cartoon figures of the dogs, on a background similar to one of my family tartrans! ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2007, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/this-year-you-spent-more-less-on-christmas/431409/46 "2007-12-29T01:39:28Z")
Less, by a good amount. Money’s tight right now. ---
**Author:** ![Katriona](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/katriona/32/113_2.png) [@Katriona](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Katriona)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2007, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/this-year-you-spent-more-less-on-christmas/431409/47 "2007-12-29T01:39:35Z")
[QUOTE=Eureka] More. Not a whole lot more, but more. It’s not intentional, it’s just a case that I forgot about the stuff I purchased before December when purchasing stuff in December. [/QUOTE] That’s become one of my mom’s traditions - 'round about February she’ll find something that she forgot about. It’s usually my brother for some reason, but sometimes it’s me. ---
**Author:** ![Skylark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@Skylark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skylark)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2007, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/this-year-you-spent-more-less-on-christmas/431409/48 "2007-12-29T18:58:30Z")
I spent much, much more on shopping this year. But this was also one of the first years I’ve ever had a job of any consequence, so I spent a great deal of effort getting many things for people to show off how well I was doing with my new station in life (and I’m flat broke until Monday…). ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2007, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/this-year-you-spent-more-less-on-christmas/431409/49 "2007-12-29T19:49:59Z")
Much less, and only partly because I made less money this year. I spent almost twice as much last year and no one cared much for their gifts which left me feeling resentful. This year I was more careful to buy things I **knew** were wanted, and got a better reception from everyone. Go figure. ---
**Author:** ![BrknButterfly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/439d5e/32.png) [@BrknButterfly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrknButterfly)\ **Post date:** [December 29, 2007, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/this-year-you-spent-more-less-on-christmas/431409/50 "2007-12-29T23:50:42Z")
I spent less. Like nothing. Well actually, I bought gifts for the one person that accepts me for me. My BFF. Besides him, everyone else could suck it. Rent comes first. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2007, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/this-year-you-spent-more-less-on-christmas/431409/51 "2007-12-30T17:26:44Z")
Infinitely more this year. We only buy gifts for anyone if we happen to find something appropriate. We refuse to buy gifts just because it’s December. Last year nothing was found and so zero dollars were spent on anyone. This year I found one nice item & and one whimsical item for my wife, some $500 total. She found two nice things for me, some $40 total. The rest of our extended families? Zilch. They’re all nice people and we all like each other and we all have plenty of money, but gifts are a useless holdover from a prior era of human scarcity that none of us much care about. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/this-year-you-spent-more-less-on-christmas/431409.md?page=2)