Scroogeonomics: the Christmas gift that keeps on giving by Jessica Irvine

Scroogeonomics: the Christmas gift that keeps on giving by Jessica Irvine

Topic: Scroogeonomics: the Christmas gift that keeps on giving

Writter: Jessica Irvine

Publish Date: Sunday, 17 December 2017

Published on : The AGE News

Scroogeonomics: the Christmas gift that keeps on giving

For many years, my mother has sought to persuade the rest of our family to move to a Kris Kringle model of gift giving at Christmas.

And for many years, I staunchly resisted the idea, determined, instead, to see our Christmas morning littered with a proliferation of cheap socks, jocks and books.

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Illustration: Jim Pavlidis 

This year, I have capitulated.

Instead of buying a multitude of modest gifts, this year I have only had to buy one present with a more sizeable – but hardly exorbitant – price tag of $50.

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Joshua Millburn (right) and Ryan Nicodemus, who run the site and movement The Minimalists. Photo: Supplied

In the spirit of openness and transparency, a few weeks ago, Dad pulled names out of a hat and issued an all-points email informing all family members of their corresponding gift recipient.

(This is in contrast to the Secret Santa method, in which gift givers and recipients remain anonymous – at least until the moment of exchange).

My only sadness about this will be the absence this year of that most visually pleasing image of the season – the undergrowth of a Christmas tree groaning with freshly wrapped presents. And the absence, too, of that corresponding Christmas eve ritual of fiercely competing with siblings for the scarce resource of the sticky tape dispenser and secreting oneself in an obscure corner of the house to wrap presents. I'm something of an expert wrapper. Precision is my jam – could you guess?

Anyway, this year I instead get to enjoy the cognitive harmony of finally observing the advice of the economists I have come to so worship in my professional life.

For well over a decade, I have been writing a yuletide column explaining "Scroogeonomics" – the theory of the widespread destruction of value that comes with gift giving.

As the theory goes, no person is more capable of determining what product or service will give them pleasure above what it costs to purchase it. Without this knowledge, gift givers commonly pay a sum above the value that the recipient will derive from consuming or possessing the product or service – resulting in a dead weight loss to the economy at large.

The only responsible thing to do, according to economists, is to either not give gifts at all, or give gift cards loaded with cash, to enable gift recipients to select a product from which they will receive maximum value.

Bah humbug, indeed.

More recently, this wisdom has been challenged, even from within economics, to also take into account the hedonic pleasure gift recipients may derive from doing something nice. Or the pleasure a gift recipient may derive from knowing the recipient thought about them, and really tried to pick them something nice.

Our Kris Kringle model – while bearing an unfathomably awful Americanised title – combines advantages from both schools of thought. By continuing some element of gift giving, our family will get to enjoy some of the pleasure of thinking of others.

But by only buying one gift each, we will minimise the potential deadweight losses of the entire enterprise.

For me, it's the natural end to a year in which I've discovered the wonders of "minimalism". What began as a general tidying up and de-cluttering urge, inspired by the Japanese organising expert Marie Kondo, has blossomed into full blown conversion to the minimalist cause. Espoused in any number of online American blogs and podcasts, including The Minimalists, Becoming Minimalist and Be More With Less – the latter which advises dressing with only 33 items of clothing for 3 months – the movement has also spread to Australia.

Basically, we spend too much time working just to earn money to buy crap we don't need or enjoy. We end up bearing not only the initial cost, but an ongoing drag from living in cluttered homes we feel too guilt-ridden to downsize.

Minimalism isn't about throwing out all your stuff and sitting crossed legged in the middle of your living room clutching only a pencil (although I have veered into that territory myself).

As the two charismatic leaders of the movement in the US, Joshua Fields Millburn and Ryan Nicodemus, repeat in their blogs, podcasts and speaking events (they're coming to Australia next year), minimalism is "the thing that gets us past the things so we can make room for life's important things – which actually aren't things at all".

Side effects of minimalism are not limited to, but include, more money, less stress, more time and greater focus on relationships, values and pondering the big questions in life – rather than spending one's spare time tidying the garage.

The only exception to our new minimalist Christmas this year will be my son, who will continue to be showered with gifts from everyone, including the big man himself.

But even there, there is potential room for improvement.

In an article for the latest issue of the Infant Behaviour and Development journal titled "The influence of the number of toys in the environment on toddler's play", researchers from The University of Toledo report the findings of an experiment.

The researchers coaxed 36 toddlers into their experiment – no mean feat in itself – where they were given half an hour of supervised time with an adult to play with either 4 toys or 16 toys.

The result were clear: "An abundance of toys present reduced quality of toddlers' play."

So any parents and grandparents feeling worried they haven't provided enough presents this year, can take heart from the study's findings.

 "With fewer toys, participants had fewer incidences of toy play, longer durations of toy play, and played with toys in a greater variety of ways. This suggests that when provided with fewer toys in the environment, toddlers engage in longer periods of play with a single toy, allowing better focus to explore and play more creatively."

A timely reminder that the most precious gifts we can give our children – and each other – this Christmas are simply our precious time, and attention.

Happy Christmas to all.