Somehow I don't think my grandmother's heart wouldnd be gladdened if I chose to forgo buying her a nice, thoughtful gift in favor of taking her to the park in the middle of winter. She may be elderly, but that doesn't make her a sap.
5
Fruitcakes can be great if people are using the right recipe. Don't use maraschino cherries and it shouldn't have enough preservatives to be shipped via mailorder and stored until the following year.
7
I agree...fruitcakes are often maligned, but my husband and his friend love them. Every year I struggle to find a good one because they are connoisseurs!
3
On the fruitcake: even a fruitcake can acquire charm over the years.
My late father, notoriously poor as a gift giver, had heard that Collin Street Bakery, in Texas, made an acclaimed fruitcake. That was my dad’s holiday gift, shipped to me year after year after year. (An additional oddity: we are Jewish...) The fruitcake got eaten very gradually over the course of the year as an emergency snack.
I now think fondly of my dad’s fruitcakes. A holiday tradition is to be cherished— even a fruitcake tradition in a Jewish family!
11
Oh how funny. American Enterprise - "We take away. Giving is for dummies, not greedy Libertarians."
8
Nice column, but tying the AEI and "charity" in the same sentence? Surely you're joking.
12
Every single column of Brooks is sugar-coated conservatism, but in each 1 he gives himself away. The chutzpa of him to call AEI a "large non-profit organization" is outrageous. It is clearly a conservative political company promoting its agenda non-stop. If contributions to them r tax-deductible, it is a criminal and moral travesty.
5
Arthur Brooks is not my favorite person in the world as head of the American Enterprise Institute, but this is nonetheless a charming column.
6
What, pray tell, was charming about it? I know Brooks always TRIES to be charming, but he usually gives away his conservative agenda.
2
My fruitcakes are fabulous. People beg for them. Stop dissing fruitcakes.
8
On behalf of those of us who actually appreciate a good fruitcake I would say that only a fruitcake could come up with the Fruitcake Principle.
4
The perfect gift is one that the receiver did not ask for nor realize that he wanted, but once revealed be deemed absolutely essential for practical or esthetic reasons. This is, of course, nearly impossible to pull off, which makes it a worthwhile goal.
Fruitcake gets a bad rap. I loved the rum soaked bricks that my mother made every November. Christmas was nigh.
Your economics columns are much sillier than this one, but not as enjoyable. Have a merry.
7
I actually love really good quality fruitcake as long as it is thoroughly soaked with Irish whiskey or dark rum- so please feel free to send me your unwanted fruitcake as long as you soak it in vast quantities of good liquor.
10
May I suggest a 100 dollar contribution to the Democratic Party to fight the Religious Right's and the GOP's war on Science.
23
I keep hearing about gifted children. Do they need to be elaborately wrapped?
22
thank you for the gift of your tongue in cheek writing!
1
I'd hoped there'd be A LIST!!!
1
Let's hope we can all find a great and demanding purpose
1
Hmmm.....and I JUST read an article that claimed that fancy wrapping on bad gifts makes them even LESS desirable (as people get their hopes up!)
I guess that is what happens when scientists use dubious, unsited research....
4
I was solely disappointed by this article. I'm a scientist and expected
suggestions of gifts by other like me. You know, like moon globes or plastic models of the Large Hadron Collider, or those red coffee cups
that have the Standard Model Lagangian of physics in tiny type and in
huge type "What Part of Do You Not Understand?"
Instead we get some politically correct blather from the rather discredited "Social" wannabe "Scientists". Its best to just chuckle and buy a bunch of the red cups.
2
Boy, the Grinchies are out in force today! I disagree with Brooks too, as a rule, but this was a fun and interesting read. Lighten up, will you?
3
I like your wife. (And your article ..humorous and honest) Nice to have a giggle Saturday morning. My husband is bewildered by gift buying and gift wrapping? Quote: why gift wrap if you just tear it off and toss it? He does have a point.
1
Perhaps the gift of wrapping paper would be best.
4
What happened to the theory that my junk is someone else's treasure!
1
Thank God for Mrs. See. Chocolates for everybody.
3
Stop the madness! Holidays once every four years like the Olympics or Presidential elections.
Good old Arthur Brooks. The policies he advocates result in redistribution from poor to rich, but the silver lining is that those poor shlubs at the top won’t be any happier after they trade up to an even more expensive Mercedes whereas the rest of us will attain true nirvana by taking grandma to the park and regifting (since we’ll no longer be able to afford shopping at the mall). Libertarian perfect inequality is truly the best of all worlds, right Arthur?
Ho ho ho.
8
And now, if you could just give me some ideas for useless stuff that people would like or, at least, find amusing, I'd be happy to buy and wrap them with glittering abandon--and enormous bows!
2
I'm old and have accumulated way too much stuff.
I've always enjoyed finding and acquiring stuff I like, almost always 2nd hand.
When family comes for gift exchanging I say please select something I have that you would like.
I usually do not like family giving me stuff. I have not figured out how to stop it.
4
A little off topic, but since there were repeated references to fruit cakes, I will say that plastic inflatable fruit cakes in envelopes suitable for mailing are available at several internet shops. They make smile inducing gifts for fruit cake lovers and haters alike. And they are eminently re-giftable. I sent some abroad last year and they were much enjoyed.
And because I can't escape thoughts on the subject, I will also say that inflatable fruit cakes are of greater value than the republicans approaching Christmas gift to our country.
HAPPY HOLIDAYS and SEASON'S GREETINGS!
2
I have never been disappointed, I learned from mother get a budget from my husband and buy my own gifts.
Giving gifts is practicing a key human virtue: Generosity. However I'm naturally very frugal (I was brought up that way), so buying gifts carries with it the horror of spending my hard-earned money on others. Get over it, I say to myself; after all, people buy gifts for you, occasionally. So I make use of my other natural trait: thinking hard about WHAT to buy a specific person to match their interests and/or needs. It then becomes a kind of philanthropic exercise. As a reward for these efforts (including the wrapping and delivering), I buy an exorbitant gift for myself so I won't feel bad when the giftee (especially children, the dears) either does not thank you, or looks, after all your efforts on their behalf, hopelessly blank and unresponsive when they open it. The worst that can happen is if the kid says loudly, in front of everybody, "How much did you pay for this?" (a true story, alas!)
1
I have to place on record my deep appreciation to Arthur C. Brooks for Gift wrapping the article with lots of extensive research from Carnegie Mellon(i thought they specialised in Computers & AI) to Journal of Psychology...ON GIFTS.
Frankly,this article is an eye opener to me as to how people perceive gifts,specially the appreciation for good wrapping.
A very informative article indeed.
1
Mr. Brooks, you forgot to mention the office "secret Santa" gag gifts--utterly useless and annoying to boot!
Thanks indeed for your Christmas gift, to me, of humor and laughs!
1
STUFF
In fifty-five years of marriage
we’ve acquired a great deal of stuff,
of which we have more than enough.
And as the holidays will soon approach,
I fear gifts on our space will encroach.
So if your planning a gift to send,
with our pricelist some time please spend.
It will specify our price per square foot,
your gift on our floor space to put.
For counter, cabinet or wall space
our price has a slightly lower base.
STUFF
In fifty-five years of marriage
we’ve acquired a great deal of stuff,
of which we have more than enough.
And as the holidays will soon approach,
I fear gifts on our space will encroach.
STUFF
In fifty-five years of marriage
we’ve acquired a great deal of stuff,
of which we have more than enough.
And as the holidays will soon approach,
I fear gifts on our space will encroach.
So if your planning a gift to send,
with our pricelist some time please spend.
It will specify our price per square foot,
your gift on our floor space to put.
For counter, cabinet or wall space
our price has a slightly lower base.
We prefer experience to stuff.
Thus consumables small or large,
we accept completely free of charge.
And if visiting us is what you’d like to do,
much pleased we’d be to pay for you.
- for the price of dinner that is.
2
Enjoyable though I will say, a Caribbean style fruitcake (or black cake) is an edible piece of joy! Regift here to me please....
2
But don’t bother with beautifully wrapped presents for children. For them, it’s not how it’s wrapped, it’s what’s inside.
2
This should have been called Gift-Giving Tips for Everybody Else. Now that income inequality has been fully institutionalized, these tips make a lot of sense. I might add a few...
-Reuse wrapping paper.
-Glue sticks do less damage to the wrapping paper than Scotch tape.
-Although cash is unromantic, sometimes a friend just needs some heating oil.
-Dried beans are very inexpensive and high in protein.Wrap them in Amazon boxes you find in front of the rich-folk houses.
-There are several good books now reaching the used book bins on home surgery and folk medicine. Foxfire books are available online if you have access to a public library that still has wifi and the sites are not slowed to a crawl by high rollers like Facebook and Netflix.
-Get your Christmas tree from a school. Most schools shut down for the holidays and their holiday decorations usually end up out back in a dumpster. Sometimes the tree still has tinsel on it.
-On a similar subject, garbage is especially good after Christmas. IPhone 6s and maybe even 7s should be hitting the streets.
All you 1-percenters reading this, please throw the old tech out, do not put it in a drawer. We are counting on your tinkle down. Also, when you get your self-driving cars, please think about perhaps giving one ride to a stranger every month or so. You do not even have to be there. No doubt jalopies will soon be outlawed, so we will need the kindness of royalty to get us to the grocery store, where we be forced pilfer.
4
Even better: No gifts at all to anyone over the age of 12.
Saves a lot of time, money and disappointment.
Before me sits a pen stand which one of my now-grown children made for me, once upon a time, out of a truncated milk carton and Santa-Claus-spotted wrapping paper. It will hold my pens as long as I am able to hold them myself.
This will sound awfully priggish, but I'll say it anyway because it's true. Whether from children or from adults, I like handmade, intrinsically worthless (or consumable) gifts best of all by far.
Granted, this is partly because I already have enough stuff and partly because nobody can quite match my own taste in selecting stuff. But it's mainly because a thought wrapped up as a present or set before me as if I were a king has an effect no commercially-available gift has: it makes me happy.
Thank you for your delightful column of Christmas cheer.
1
I'm going to offer my gift giving idea but it contradicts what you're writing, Mr. Brooks. Every Christmas, write down the names of everyone you plan on buying a gift for and the amount you will probably spend on each person. Add the amounts together and go out and buy yourself a gift (or several) that you really want in that amount. Then send a card to each person on your list, thanking them for their gift and wishing them Happy Holidays. This eliminates the problem of receiving many gifts that you don't want every year. After all, how many gifts that you received last year do you remember? This also eliminates the angst of spending hours shopping trying to find the "perfect" gift for each person. The holidays will become a lot more relaxing. You can do this for your children as well who will undoubtedly be delighted to buy toys they really want.
2
I like your wife and your humorous honest column. Nice to have a laugh Saturday morning. My husband is flummoxed by gift giving and wrapping is ridiculous to him: "don't you just tear it off and throw it out?" If you take a humorous view of the xmas gift buying anxiety it will all go easier ( with some wine and fruit cake: dip any cake in wine or liquor and it will taste good)
10
In the years when the Sunday papers included page after page of "the funnies," I saved them all year and used them as Chanukah gift wrap for the kids. They were colorful; the children enjoyed rereading them; and recycling them involved nary a twinge of guilt, since that's what would have happened to them months earlier anyway. They could even be used to try out the new Silly Putty.
15
What a lovely gift—something thoughtful and clever from the president of the American Enterprise Institute! What better time than Christmas to discover that not every conservative thinks only of a glorious return to living in caves, smashing rocks together as a productive activity. Perhaps that wit and intelligence could be applied to the policies of economic devastation being enacted by our current “leaders”.
17
Thank you for the gift you probably didn't realize you had given: the admission by one of their own that most economists are soulless utilitarians! Ha! I do know a few who seem to have something akin to a soul, but they've generally escaped - or perhaps have been ejected from - the clutches of the academic world. But thanks for the light read in a time when it's sorely needed. Happy Merry New Hanukkah Christmas Kwanzaa Holiday Year!
9
An ideal gift is a pleasant surprise. I answered my doorbell this afternoon and a young handsome couple were at the door. They announced that they were new to the neighborhood and wanted to introduce themselves. I asked where they were coming from their answer was China. They presented me with a gard and a small gift box. I welcomed them and told them that our neighborhood contained people from all over the world and they would be very welcome. When they left I opened the gift box and found a lovely Christmas ornament for our tree. My wife and I will find an appropriate welcome gift for them. What a wonderful visit, not totally unexpected since the Microsoft main campus is very close. We really are one world.
25
Ah yes, The American Enterprise Institute. If I remember correctly, they advocate taking useless things (like money and security) away the poor, and regifting them to the very appreciative rich. Said regifting nicely wrapped, of course, in deregulation and tax breaks.
45
Give a gift of knowledge.
Give a gift of trust.
Give a gift of serenity.
Be humble if you must.
Take heart in each new sunrise.
Put hope in each new day.
Treasure what you leave behind,
not what you take away.
7
Funny piece, but your fruitcake principal has a serious flaw.
I love fruitcake, but I know most people do not. By your fruitcake principal, it would be ok for me to regift one. But I would only do that to a person that liked them.
Counter to the fruitcake principal, I'll offer the Country Music principal. I don't like country music. If someone gave me a country music cd, I would be right to give it to one of my country music loving friends. After wrapping it very nicely.
14
With such an array of choices, we seem set for Christmas, nicely wrapped and thoughtfully sent. The contents are up to you but beware that it's true intention may be obvious at the receiving end.
If we want to be environmentally friendly, we will go easy on that wrapping paper.
I used maps and botanical charts from national parks on some gifts this year. I also have used especially attractive shopping bags--stapled shut, bows tied atop-- for others. ( Who could object to an elegant bag from the Peace Hotel, Shanghai?!)
7
Perhaps the best gift is the one you never knew you received. Two of my friends replaced the fake Christmas tree my family always decorated with a real one without telling me. It was only after about a week I realized what had happened and I discovered the gift givers. Like I said maybe the best gift you receive is the one you never knew you got until after the gift was given.
9
Economics is not a science.
There are way too many variables and unknowns to craft the double-blind controls to provide repeatable predictable results that are the essence of scientific inquiry. Economics is gender, color aka race, ethnicity, faith, national origin, sociology, anthropology, politics and history plus arithmetic. There is no Nobel Prize in Economics. There is the Swedish National Bank Prize in Memory of Alfred Nobel funded in 1968.
As a field of academic inquiry, economics is like politics, sociology, anthropology, theology, law, history, accounting, banking and finance. Economics is not biology nor physics nor chemistry nor mathematics. Besides the minions of the Donald John Trump Administration from top to bottom deems all science as "fake news."
6
Agree completely! Here is a good rule of thumb for the general public: If you don't have a unit of measure for the object in question, (such as "happiness," or "job satisfaction") then you can't measure it. If you can't measure it then you can't quantify it. If you can't quantify it, then you aren't doing science.
For instance, what are units of happiness? Of course, there are none and you can't measure it.
Many social "scientists" confuse opinion polls using the Likert Scale (which is composed of a series of non-falsifiable client questions) with actual measurement of the underlying hidden variable, such as happiness.
6
True, social sciences are inherently inexact, but that doesn't mean the efforts to measure unquantifiable things like happiness are useless or should be abandoned.
I actually heard about a study that suggests NOT wrapping thing beautifully, because the person is more likely to be disappointed in the gift because it's anticlimactic.
2
Well it seems that the author(s) of that study apparently have never heard of brown fuzzy spiders.
I agree! A crummy gift is such a disappointment no matter how it is wrapped.
The true "gift" of this season lies not in "things" but in the experience. Our ancestors knew that the winter solstice was a time not of the "Coming of Christ" but a time of the "Christening" for each of us.
The three days from December 21st to the 23rd are a time when our spirit is open to the Christening. That is we can harness the Devine energy of the universe to assist us on our evolutionary path, as long as that path is constant with gods laws. That path of course has nothing to do with acquiring things.
The true 'gift' of the season is knowing this ancient lesson and using it wisely. Hence the fable of the three "wise men".
The solstice is a time to identify with our higher nature, our true Self. Through meditation and ritual we plant the seeds in the dark, fertile ground of our spirit which grows and bears fruit in the coming year.
So the real gift that we can give ourselves and others is the recognition of the "No-thing", the formlessness of God and its universality in all things, which make up the forms of the universe. Do we think that the message to be sown of "peace and good will" was simply part of a story for children?
This was the real lesson taught by the historic Jesus that unfortunately over centuries have devolved into our current obsession with meaningless materialism.
But, it's never too late. On these three days of the deepest darkness the brightest light shines, and does so each and every year. Peace.
6
"Going on a beautiful bike ride" demands that someone had bought a bike.
5
How is it that Amazon has a death grip on retail when to receive a gift from Amazon is, in my fortunately limited experience of the company, a soul-destroying event? Yesterday I opened an Amazon Christmas box from a relative. Nothing was wrapped, so any element of surprise was squandered. There was no card just a perfunctory small square paper with my relative's name on it. The present was snack portions of food packed in supermarket-sized cartons crudely taped closed. I'm not ungrateful, but I would have loved opening a "worthless" present that had been lovingly attended to, rather than an expensive Amazon gift that looked like a warehouse robot had swept its arm along a shelf and shovelled whatever into a cardboard box.
18
It may be that your gift had to pass Customs. In my experience, gifts from another
country are usually opened and sloppily rewrapped. Amazon is blamed for
a lot these days-- but, in your case, they may be innocent.
1
BOYCOTT/GIRLCOTT Amazon. I've been Amazon free for years and it feels better all the time.
1
Giving an experience is not a lasting gift. A three-dimensional object is. Think of your gift-recipient living reasonably dangerously, and give him/her/it a scooter with a sidecar or a 1880s gunslinger's revolver. Such gifts will always be engraved in memory.
5
Dear Mr Brooks,
Thank you for the one truly priceless gift: laughter.
Merry Xmas and Happy 2018.
4
I'm not even in the top 20%, but if friends need financial help, they know that I have a soft heart. Last year two friends, both who work very hard to move their businesses, borrowed $2000 each due to financial stress. A few days before Christmas, I phoned each to wish them Happy Holidays and told them that I'd forgiven their debts. As the Lord's prayer says . . . .
By the way, I'm a Christmas-hating atheist.
36
I enjoyed this essay.
So, i re-gifted it.
13
My extended family decided about a decade ago (after the children had grown) to stop giving personal gifts at Christmas, and to have White Elephant gift-exchange parties instead. Each person brings 2-3 gifts, none costing >$25, and some being total gags, so the individual expenses are modest. All the presents are wrapped, some rather extravagantly, often deliberately misleadingly. After dinner, we spend an hour or so going through the gifts, cycling from youngest to oldest, with the opportunity to "steal" gifts during a turn (which can then being stolen back, for a maximum of 2 steals). It keeps the focus on our connections as a family instead of on material things, and the fun is easily extended to include visiting friends (who can easily pick up a couple of inexpensive gifts to contribute to the mix and then join in the fun). (This doesn't mean we don't give individual presents to each other, the rest of the year, but we keep the focus during Christmas on shared experiences, with the White Elephant party being one of the highlights, with lots of laughter.)
23
Mixed feelings about wrapping.
I love to wrap carefully special presents such as a first edition of a wonderful book of poetry.
I like to design a Christmas scene on top, such as Mexican clay and straw figures and animal around a blown glass goblet, as if a village square or a merry go round of chinese fluorescent turquoise and orange and red and green sold threaded animals.
So it is both beautiful and disconcerting to visit and see the presents unopened almost five decades later lest the scene disappear! Not just once, but several times.
15
I wish that you could have posted a picture!
8
My new tradition is to give my husband a small photo book of a trip or outting we did together with our family. This year I went through all my old digital files and found some memorable ones of the dog we adopted. We have so many memories of her with our family. She was special.
20
As a husband I roll my eyes and say: he must really love you.
If it’s that new, I am sure it’s a tradition! Let’s say a new way of doing things....
I like the nicely wrapped gift idea. I have been a little overwhelmed by the number of gifts relatives kindly send my kids, unwrapped because they come from Amazon. If one did it, no big deal, but they all come unwrapped now. I've figured it out by buying lots of gift-bags we recycle year to year, but if you're buying for a young family, do realize it adds significant stress to have to wrap all your presents as well as all the presents of the people giving you gifts.
25
Obviously a new "Prime" service is needed that will offer a check-off at the shipping window which selects a posting box with holiday-wrap exterior and a banner suggesting "do not open till Christmas"
2
Less shopping! We switched to giving mostly things to eat, things to read, things to watch, things to do or donations to non-profits - it works really well. Fewer unneeded unwanted objects makes the whole gift giving experience much more fun. And some fruitcakes are really delicious (homemade with dried fruit instead of candied fruit and plenty of brandy).
59
willow - less shopping, for sure - one sure way to help save the planet!
1
At Christmas the only thing I try not to open is old wounds.
Oh, and the presents under the tree at the mall are empty boxes? I got the same gifts as a boy and my father said they were filled with Christmas magic.
Life is about packaging- you have to unwrap it to enjoy it.
31
I liked the Ann Patchett op-ed on giving up shopping and buying clothes, gadgets and other discretionary consumer goods for a year. It is freeing and indeed saves huge amounts of time, and money. I suggest everyone give up shopping and buying gifts for the next year or more as a gift to corporate America. And thank the Republicans for making this necessary.
105
www.montgomerycrystalco.com
not corporate. not clothes. not gadgets. certainly discretionary.
2
That article is amazing, thanks for mentioning it. Here's the link:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/15/opinion/sunday/shopping-consumerism.html
1
I just wanted to let Mr. Brooks know that he is hilarious.
22
What you forgot to mention is that the female spider then eats the male after copulation.
So much for the brilliant gift idea.
56
No accounting for taste.
I really don’t like fruitcake. But I’d never “toss” one - why waste good food? Say: “You, dear pal, like fruitcake, while I do not. Would you like this one?” So simple.
16
I have a small group of crows who will eat fruitcake -- and don;t care a whit about the wrapping.
7
The gifts that really move me are any that reflect the giver's notice of some remark I made about something I loved/wished for/enjoyed doing. Doesn't really matter what they are. Gifts that show the giver was listening.
71
i couldn't agree more - - so yes, sometimes it's an objet, or a food, or an experience or a book or really anything. it's about showing that you listen, you look, you remember and here is something that reflects that.
2
indeed! I have a daughter who excels at this type of giving. if I regift a gift it will be to local organizations both animal and human who are having silent auctions. Happy New Year!
2
When reading Brooks ' superficially avuncular piece, it's good to remember that his right-wing tax dodge slavers at making rich whites richer, and hurting minorities.
48
Hey, quit picking on fruitcake. My family always begs for my wife's homemade fruitcake. You just haven't had good ones.
82
When I was a little kid, I'm decades past that now, I had an aunt who gave us a fruitcake every holiday season. I think their still in my mother's freezer.
As long as it has been soaked in enough rum, it is edible. If it doesn't have a notice to keep it away from an open flame, it probably isn't very good.
My sister-in-law sends us excellent home made fruitcakes. She soaks them in wine for several days before sending them.
I wonder if I could interest anyone in hand-knit scarves...?
In spiders and some insects, the males are themselves the gift, copulating with the female while she devours hims. There is a certain intimacy in sexual cannibalism, especially since he provides resources to his future offspring that the female passes on by producing more and higher quality eggs.
But of course, males can benefit by mating with as many females as possible if he can avoid the fate of the males in the previous paragraph. Hence the empty gift giving deception by a real cad.
7
Dr. Clark. Might want to stick to administrator if that organization you front. This is not funny or useful. Actually if you meant it to be serious, that did not work either. The suggestions lack credibility. Final, move along readers, no real science here. All in all a perfect swing and a miss. Still, you tried. Happy holidays.
9
I totally agree with all three suggestions. Useful gives are often boring and unimaginative. The challenge is to give a gift that the recipient didn't know they wanted and that they will love.
1
I'd like to say a word in defense of fruitcakes. I've been baking them and giving them as gifts for many years, and most recipients eagerly check to see if they're still on my list, and if this year's fruitcake will be bigger than last year's.
No, I don't give them to people who prefer not receiving one. But I've done practicums with friends who wanted to learn how to make them for themselves. A nephew once tried to take his family's fruitcake back to college so he wouldn't have to share it.
If you use quality ingredients they're not cheap to make, but really good fruits and butter and nuts and brandy make all the difference. Doorstop fruitcakes are made cheaply and carelessly, and deserve to be tossed. But don't say that about mine.
51
You lost me at social science It’s an oxymoron if there ever was one.
10
"Tell Grandma that you were planning to buy her a Mercedes, but after reading some social science research, you have decided to take her to the park instead. She might look a little disappointed, but no doubt in her heart she will be glad." - Really? Seriously?
If you can afford to buy your grandmother a Mercedes, do it, and then take her to the park in it every Sunday... THAT would probably make her glad.
64
I find Arthur Brooks's political opinions pretty odious but he is a darned funny dry writer.
Also: Arthur, how do you know the boxes under the mall Christmas tree were empty?
20
I endorse your opinion wholeheartedly.
Best gift: nothing ... so the receiver doesn't feel obligated to reciprocate. I hate receiving gifts ...makes me beholden one way or another. I'd prefer not to even have to send a thank you note, let alone go out and buy a return gift. Yup, I'm a curmudgeon.
27
Thanks for many smiles and chuckles as I read this. It was the gift of a column wrapped in humor--a surprise after what the headline promised.
6
Gift=giving tips from ecologists: Skip the wrapping. Total waste of natural resources. Give things that will last; right now, a contribution to any one of several dozen organizations fighting to save our natural resources would be just the ticket. (I'm sure the president of the American Enterprise Institute would disagree vehemently). And this year, give the best gift of all - donations to Democratic candidates for the 2018 midterms.
81
Yes, I shudder at all of the wasted wrapping materials having to be burned, buried and rarely recycled. Use the money saved for something worth while: helping people, animals, the environment or yes, even the Democratic Party.
And giving the gift of experience doesn't require a gift package at all.
3
Or re-use materials you have already that can be used as gift wrapping. We save nice/ unique looking shopping bags, tissue paper, ribbons, bows, etc. from shopping or gifts we're received over the years. Also, splendid calendars (we buy fancier ones), the comic strip sections of newspapers, interesting scraps of fabric. Then re-use them for gift wrapping. I've never had anyone complain: instead people remark how cool the wrapping is and how they do or will do similarly.
I used to make handmade X-mas cards for fun. Don't have time to do it anymore but was a bit surprised when talking to people later how many cherished those cards as pieces of art even years later.
5
WastingTime - You advise skipping the wrapping. Two points - one, often, the wrapping paper was made in the U.S.A. - a plus. Second, just pick off the tape and fold the paper neatly to use next year. More fun to open a gaily wrapped gift than not.
1
What fun to read! I admire your sense of humor and practical advice— thanks for the gift.
7
A delightfully light-hearted yet eminently practical article: THANK YOU!!! Amid all the doom and gloom about terrorism, the Middle East, Brexit, looming trade wars and Trump's mad stampede to give away the USA to Vested Interests and to re-ignite class, race and every manner of ideological warfare, offerings such as this gem are like a fresh, pure, cooling stream of water in a parched and suffering landscape. I SALUTE YOU!!
7
This year: We shipped 7 cases of supplies to the Adopt a Family US Virgin Islands hurricane relief. One case of stuffed animals and child size blankets, the rest cleaning and food supplies.
42
I am afraid that the author's pontification reveal's mainly the value (in gift giving and other terms) of advice and "expertise." I am no spider expert, but from the point of view of evolution, the male spider is almost certainly displaying its health and vigor through the silk-wrapped gift to the female. The value of the gift itself, as with human gifts, often has an underlying motive to enhance the gift-givers status with the recipient, and may also involve sex and the potential for procreation if you believe the many commercials from jewelry outlets for worthless baubles. The wrapping can certainly add to the impression of one's capabilities, and perhaps even one's suitability as a caring mate and parent. We like to think of ourselves as rational creatures, but we are still driven by many of the same imperatives as the birds and the bees.
17
Clever and always nice to see a conventional economist go outside his training to appreciate the value of conflicting social science, and realize that we can learn from nature. The partial rescue of re-gifting is also welcome, although the casual "toss it" and reluctant endorsement of packaging need to be re-thought. Perhaps someone hungry can really use that metaphorical "fruitcake," while both otherwise quickly wind up in the waste stream.
Brooks should go further and read today's "My Year of No Shopping" by Ann Patchett. She explores whether we really need all the things we buy, and finds that we usually don't.
She doesn't banish gift-giving, but includes the giving of time, which can be valuable and appreciated.
Then there's Kristof's column from two weeks ago: "For the Holidays, Pull a Tooth or Save a Life." Aren't there better uses of the money spent, such as first-time dental care to a poor person, than the quickly diminished pleasure after opening a box?
Of course, recipients of gifts need to let it be known that they are open to such substitutes.
P.S. Regarding "As the president of a large nonprofit...a long walk on the beach is not what your favorite charity is looking for from you," perhaps he should re-think this as well. While you'd think they would be better, non-profits have some of the same dysfunctional practices that I've seen in business, government, and academia. A little time talking to someone in the presence of the ocean could be quite a "gift."
10
Once upon a time I worked in a government financial bureau that received annual financial reports (revenue and expenses) from non-profits that provided services to disabled individuals. The reports were quite enlightning, at SOME agencies executive staff were paid quite handsomely, and as far as the "not-for-profit" part goes, what I will call "surplus not-for-profit revenue" was transfered into a separate entity, that the non-profit it self had established, that was a foundation established for some other, but related, function.
1
got it! I'm off to the mall; maybe this year the recipients will be happy.
Are your grandparents buried in an old cemetery, next to an old church? Make a donation for the cemetery upkeep. I guarantee they need it, and will be very grateful.
30
I'll gladly take the fruitcake! I've always loved good, moist fruitcake.
5
In at least some cases, giving cash is ridiculous. Suppose a husband and wife give each other $100. What's the point? And what if the amounts are different?!
7
Money gifts are for nieces and nephews.
Love this: "No matter how terrible your gift, wrap it up nicely."
Here's a story. Long ago, my parents found themselves with little money and a large new house and frightening deep debts. McDonnell-Douglas stock had tanked. But Christmas was coming. So my mother began nosing around garage sales.
On Christmas morning, there were enormous gilded gift boxes crowded under the tree. I opened my first one. Big box, full of tissue paper. In it? A small ceramic castle retrieved from an aquarium, and resold. It was still kind of mossy. My mother said, "You can keep your pencils in it." Yes, there was a little hollow tower (recently explored by goldfish?). My sister had just opened her first gift. Some used scuffed catcher's mit for holding ... lipsticks? We soon ran crying up the stairs.
I laugh remembering that day, and my mother's resolve. That's a gift.
15
'Tis the Season of Frenzy - i.e. Christmas gifting, Hannukah gifting, Diwali gifting, in this last buying sprint to celebrate an old year dying and a new year being born. Arthur Brooks's tongue-in-cheek recipe of gift-giving from "scientists" was just another piece of fodder for the sacred cow of Christmas giving in America. If you do not want or need anything, save the love and thoughts of friends and family, that's the best gift of all in our skewed mall and online shopping Christmas carny of consumerism. We know beautifully wrapped presents are a riot to rampage through and unwrap the ephemera of our age (though some people slowly, carefully remove the costly wrappings and bows for regifting next year). Certain gifts are irreplacable - the gift of time spent with a dear friend, the gift of a snail-mail Christmas card from grandchildren, the gift of a loving phone call from a far-away relative, and a gift of food - notwithstanding the delicious ancient fruitcake which is regifted over and over. Not much can beat the thoughtfulness of friends giving donations in your name to their favourite "causes" for peace on earth, goodwill to men and women and children on our fragile bright cerulean blue ornament of the Christmas tree that is our galaxy. I like kaleidoscopes, how about you?
10
"Apparently for spiders, as for humans, it’s the wrapping that counts, ..."
Oy vey. Say it ain't so, Arthur. There are so many directions one could take this comment...let me count the ways. Maybe after the New Year.
Happy holidays. Merry Christmas for those who want to "bring it back."
4
This column was sadly lacking in gift-giving tips, from scientists or from anyone else.
Especially for older relatives, try to be alert to what they might be unconsciously depriving themselves of, such as new eye glasses or hearing aids. Those can be big-ticket items but they can make a major difference in quality of life. Offer to help them make an appointment and make it happen by getting them there and offering to help cover the bill, if needed.
Maybe you can contract a lawn service on their behalf (and with their okay).
On a less costly basis, maybe that old potato peeler or can opener has seen better days, or arthritis means that a new one with a comfort handle will be easy to find drawer space for. It's not that hard. Put yourself in their place and think about what you would want to see changed.
41
Am I the only one in the world who loves fruit cake? My late mother in law made them in old tins, wrapped for weeks in brandy-soaked cloth. I adore the chewy candied fruits, the nuts, the dark, brandied bits of cake that bind the rest together. Send them to me!!!
32
I like it too!
1
You have too much stuff lying around already that you could easily regift: books, clothes, jewelry, food, knickknacks, cologne/perfume, unused gift cards, and so on.
I have some relatively inexpensive orthoceras fossils I plan to give away – they’re hundreds of millions of years old as it is, so perhaps they are the ultimate in regifting.
How about giving away a box of air? It’s useless. But it’s something everybody needs. And you can wrap it up nicely. Get a cute card to go with it, or better yet, make the card yourself.
Then wait for the deals after the holidays are over. Combine those items with your regifts. If you’ve thought ahead, you already took back the empty boxes to reuse for the real gifts to be delivered in January sometime.
And after the New Year kicks in, there are always great bargains on wrapping paper. You can give that away as a gift, too. Now that’s something both useless and useful that everybody needs. And make sure you don’t forget to wrap it up nicely.
5
Our families solved the whole problem generations ago. If you are over 18, you are not expected to give or receive a gift. For my wife and I after the kids left home, we would buy one thing for the home, usually a replacement or upgrade. Most gifts amongst the family are utilitarian. For the grandkids, grand nephews and grand nieces, another deposit in their 529 is part of their gifts. Then again, both my wife and I had careers as research scientists.
21
My new favorite gift giving strategy (which lets my other half off the hook) is to buy a couple of thing I really like or need, wrap them nicely, and give them to my husband to open. He gets a surprise and I get what I wanted or needed.
11
I enjoy gifts of massages, facials, nail appointments as I consider them "splurges" and while I do treat myself, I love it when I get them as gifts. I don't need or want things--anything I need I will buy and I already have too many things. I love tickets to plays and outings to museums. That's the gift I like to give as well.
33
Give what the person wants but does not need.
18
Unless they are the upper 2 percent and you are a US member of Congress!
10
I enjoy giving the billionaire class $1 trillion and charging it to a middle class credit card while shredding healthcare for millions while Christmas caroling at the top of my larcenous lungs.
Merry Russian-Republican Orthodox Christmas !! Noel, Noel !
305
So perfect!
5
Those little children need to learn the value of selfishness.
My partner and I stopped giving each other gifts a long time ago, and we haven’t missed anything much. We buy what we each want when we want to, but only occasionally, throughout the year. As a result we don’t have as much stuff as we could have had. We are happy this way. Our extravagance of resources if you’ll call it that is centered on food (whether at home or out), music (at home or venues), looking at art (ours or museums), travel (when we also like to eat, look walk and listen); keeping healthy (gym, hikes, saunas, hot baths); spiritual pursuits (books, classes, seminar fees); giving to causes we believe in (pro conservation, pro environment, pro choice, anti poverty, help lift the underprivileged)....This is what we care about and enjoy doing, and we are not influenced by what others around us do. Btw we drive rickety cars.
86
Gift wrap makes all the difference - it shows that you have put time and thought into preparing the gift for the delight of the recipient.
22
Yes, Ellen....I thought the way that the Reverse Robin Hood Robber Baron Republicans carefully wrapped their 0.1% Christmas gift in 99% gift-wrapping was truly magical and delightful !
Many of America's adult children never even noticed that their roofs were missing....until a little later.... when the freezing ice started falling on their heads and making them sick.....Noel....Noel !!!
48
Except for kids. They could care less about the wrappings, it’s what’s inside that matters to them.
2
I have a large family, and with the exception of books for children, I try to never give them "stuff." Instead, many years ago my brother and I started making a calendar that included birth and anniversary dates as well as family photos. (One year the calendar featured favorite family recipes.) We also took everyone out to a luncheon at an interesting restaurant, so we had an additional holiday get-together that required no meal preparation. The family calendar and luncheon are still favorite traditions that everyone talks about and looks forward to.
40
Wonderful idea!
Starting last year, we began making donations to causes that the honoree supports and specifies - this year they range from the ACLU, Planned Parenthood, and the NRDC to local charities that provide food, shelter and children's services. It is far more satisfying and valuable than gifts at a time in life when we shouldn't eat sweets, have most of what we need, and the needs of others are so great.
62
I bake cookies (200+ dozen so far and counting) and distribute baskets of them to friends and neighbours. I don't know how good they are - I like them, and that's my only criterion - but it's something no one else can do in quite the same way.
Oh yeah, and we usually include in each basket a carafe of our homemade hooch (40-50 proof, depending on the year).
p.
73
I'll email you my address -- those cookies-and-hooch baskets sound just like what I need to make it through the holidays!
21
Add me to the list please!
1
My wife and I have a little Christmas gift giving every evening now. We're in our 70's and married almost 54 years. It started about 5 years ago. My wife has organized all our photos into 10 or so albums. I digitized all of them.
Every night I take one, attached it to a text message, translate the message into French, she loves the language and is fluent. The photo might be of a picnic in 1966 in Springfield, IL. Styrofoam cooler, sandwiches wrapped in wax paper, first son in a carrier on the ground next to the table. My wife replies with a memory about that day, could have been it was so hot, or our little one had just gotten over some sickness, or...
At our age memories are so important to us, so a photo from the past delivered every evening with a message is our Christmas.
276
Quite a beautiful sentiment. Thank you for sharing and Merry Christmas to you both! Joyeux noël!!
17
My family has given up gift giving -- instead we take a trip to somewhere exotic. (Tanzania one year, Morocco this year). My kids were so happy when we decided to give up gifting -- the pressure to find the perfect gift was making them miserable.
But I absolutely love finding the perfect gift. My father was a very talented marathon runner in the 1960s and 70s, but lost all his running scrap books and trophies in a California wildfire -- nothing left to show his grandchildren. I was living in Boston at the time, so I went to the public library and searched through microfiche of the Boston Globe, then found a summary showing his 7th place Boston marathon finish. I had it framed with that year's Boston marathon poster. It hung directly over his desk until his death 25 years later.
141
You really contemplated what would bring your father great joy. How thoughtful! As the author points out—quite rightly, I believe—your gift was treasured because it reminded him of a meaningful experience in his life. At this stage in my life, I’d rather have experiences than more material belongings and when I look back on it, special experiences have always been something I’ve appreciated as much as “stuff.”
50
Never was a lump of coal more more deserved and appropriate than this year by AEI!
6
The Koch-related American Enterprise Institute does not lack for donations. Arthur Brooks is its nice-guy face, but that's not what I'd call charity.
Try giving to Puerto Rico (or elsewhere). A vast population is still without power there. Imagine that, if you can!
206
By the way, there is little or no "science" in this essay. Headline is quite false.
106
Except for spiders.
2
It's a tongue in cheek column that made me laugh out loud...we all can use that, and lightening up a bit.
5
I always asked my mother for one of her hand-made fruit cakes every year. My friends always looked forward to helping me eat it with cream cheese after coffee by the campfire on the second night of our backpacking trips. I'm sorry to say I lost the recipe.
46
Cream cheese with fruitcake? What a desecration of good fruitcake! If it's bad fruitcake, just skip it and use the cream cheese for some good bagels.
The best two gifts I ever gave my mother were years apart but similar in many ways. One was when I was in high school, with little money. I bought her a new address book--terrible gift, right?-- but spent Christmas eve copying every single address out of her old, falling-to-bits address book. Including all the miscellaneous updates on post-it notes, old receipts, and other stray scraps of paper.
The other one, about ten years ago, was a digital slide scanner, with a thumb drive with copies of forty years worth of family photos from slides. Plus all of the slides, collected from various repositories around the house, each with their file number penciled in the corner.
In each case the important part of the gift was the "round tuit." As in "once I get around to it." The address book and scanner would never have been used if the gift had only been the physical object.
130
Did the gift of a donation to a worthy cause slip Mr. Brooks' mind?
58
Perhaps, like me, he doesn't recommend it. I have never given this kind of gift for Christmas or a birthday. (In lieu of flowers upon a person's death at the family's request, yes.)
Why? Because in my mind it is primarily a gift to the charity, secondly a gift for me, because it would be a charity that I would want to give to even though I know that my loved one would approve, and only thirdly for my loved one.
To every rule there are exceptions, but generally I feel that the best gift is one that goes directly to the person one cares about.
9
I give a donation to the senior group which is run by the Village in which my mother lives. She loves their field trips to various museums and gardens (etc) and the donation helps defray costs for everyone.
11
That’s in there. It must have slipped yours.
the best gift I ever gave my mother, she told me, was the year I was struggling financially, having just opened my own business, and had no funds for what I would have normally given her. instead, I recorded a cassette tape full of her favorite poems. the recording was hard, because I kept tearing up, remembering my father reading them aloud to her when he was alive. but her tears outdid my own, when she listened to them. I'd give anything to have her back to give another Christmas gift again.
233
The best way to pick good gifts is to pay attention to the recipient. I know married couples where (sadly, it's usually the male) they don't know what the partner likes, don't know what they wear, nor what they read or even what they think about. If a person bothers to notice another person's hobbies, or reading material, or passion, then that person is likely to come up with a welcomed gift.
One Christmas I shopped with my mother on Christmas Eve. Men were lined up in Victoria's Secret. They were buying pre-packaged baskets of lotions and shower gel. As the cashier rang each one up and the men heard the price (they were all over $150) each man almost fainted. But what did they expect? They wait until an hour before the stores close, stand in line at Victoria's Secret because they've heard about it, and then blow hundreds of dollars on a present their wives may or may not like.
Wouldn't it have been easier if they paid attention to their wives and found something they'd really love instead of waiting 'til 7 p.m. on Christmas Eve?
122
My hubby does this, but at least he knows my favorite perfume. Last year, he shocked me by getting me a new one. I had casually given him a little sample card of something I had tried in a store and he actually saved it and made his way to a store he’d never been to or would go to and got it! It meant so much more than the usual last minute effort (but I knew he hated shopping from thr get-go).
35
I’d have to agree, including about the gender enrichment of the clueless. But there seems a greater offense here: Baskets of goo from Victoria’s Secret? These guys might have at least purchased some see-through somethings! Just thinking along the “better to give...” idea, of course.
3