Christmas Gifts... Are they only worth $? What about ;-)

 Indeed, some economists would have us believe that Christmas gifts are an inefficient allocation of capital - that one should really just give cash or at worst gift cards because what if you end up giving a bad/unwanted gift? They profess that it is economically maximizing for the gifter to actually just give the cash to the giftee and let the giftee pick out a present on his/her own!

This train of thought conveniently forgets that part of the gifting process is the thought and effort that goes into thinking of a suitable gift, then going out and purchasing it (or going online and ordering it). It also removes the value of having a gift item associated with a particular person, i.e. the memories linked to the gifter that will be attached with the gift that is given. The Economix blog on NYT explores this idea somewhat.

Remember, gifts are not about counting the dollars and cents, truly it's the thought (and lets face it, thought=time=money) that one puts into them that really counts!