The increasing commercialised nature of Christmas is damaging families finances across the country. Even if Santa is chuting down your chimney this Christmas, parents are still being nagged by their children into buying expensive gifts. The country is spending a worrying amount on Christmas gifts in recent years, and many parents face the financial backlash in January and even long-term debt.

 

Research carried out by Saga and Netums demonstrate the extent to which parents face from their children to by costly gifts in comparison with previous generations. The exercise involving older parents from Saga and younger ones from Netmums it was concluded that parents are now spending far more on gifts than in previous years. It seems far more likely that young parents will go without a gift at Christmas in order to purchase the gift their child wants Christmas gifts than older parents. It seems older parents have stronger Christmas values.

 

Around 61% of parents born in the 1930s wouldn’t spend more than £50 in total on Christmas presents, while only 14% of parents born in the 1990s would spend less than £50; 22% said they spent £200 plus. Furthermore, 63% of younger parents revealed that they go without presents in order to buy their child gifts. Although inflation isn’t taken into account, there is a clear increase in spending patterns. It seems as if this approach could push younger parents into debt. Clearly, previous generations of parents were more sensible with their money during the Christmas periods and wouldn’t bend over backwards to get gifts for him or gifts for her. It could be time to embed the real values of Christmas back into the minds of children; not only will this save us money but it will teach children basic lessons in giving and receiving.

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