Here’s How Much North Dakotans Are Spending On Christmas

Holiday shopping is all fun and games until you look at your bank account. We live in harder financial times, so we can't go all out for the holidays.

Yes, the turbulent times have us cutting certain family members out of the gift circle. To be fair, you probably don't need to buy your third cousin or mailman a gift.

Even though we're being more careful about our spending, we still end up forking out quite a bit of cash around the holidays.

Average Holiday Spending in North Dakota

A study was done by WiseVoter.com; it looked at all fifty states and determined how much the average household spends, the findings were shocking.

The state with the highest holiday budget is Maryland. Families are spending an average of $2,714.50 on gifts each year.

What do you think, a little much?

The state spending the least while holiday shopping is West Virginia at $355.

Sadly, North Dakota is far from the bottom of this list. The source found that the average North Dakotan household spends an average of $1,138 during the holiday season. Our state ranks at 28 when compared to the other states.

Seeing how much we spend during the holidays begs the question: are we too caught up in materialism? Are we losing sight of what the holiday is actually about, or can we chalk it up to inflation?

I think the answer falls somewhat in the middle. Spending over $1,000 sounds like a lot, but if you think about it, nowadays, filling up your car with gas costs $40-65 --more in many cases.

Grocery runs that used to be $150 are now closer to $300, getting your hair done is close to $300, an don't even get me started on dental exams and healthcare.

I'm sure most of you have all of your holiday shopping done by now, but keep this in mind for next year. Ask yourself who you really need to shop for and if spending as much as you do is really that important.

Happy Holidays!

XOXO,

Gossip Girl