Thanksgiving is typically a time to celebrate abundance. But this year, some Americans are thinking about how they can afford to celebrate. Thanks to inflation and job insecurity, many families are altering how they observe the holiday or skipping the festivities altogether.
A recent Personal Capital survey found that this year, only around 7 in 10 Americans had plans to celebrate Thanksgiving, a drop from last year’s survey that reported 9 in 10 had plans to celebrate.
One in four Americans planned to skip Thanksgiving this year with Gen-Zers making up the largest swath (32%) of that group. Eighty-eight percent of Americans report cutting at least one dish from their Thanksgiving meal in an attempt to cut costs.
With the cost of turkey up 16.9%, many are eager to celebrate Friendsgiving, a more casual and cheaper alternative to Thanksgiving:
Only 24% of Friendsgiving celebrators planned on having turkey, an item that’s sure to be more pricey this year compared to last. Instead, pizza was the top choice (33%).
One reason for this is the rampant inflation that Americans are experiencing. The Bureau of Labor Statistics announced a 7.7% inflation rate for the 12 months ending in October 2022. While this is a slight decrease from the month prior, it is certainly not a cause for celebration as it still wavers near 40-year highs.
Holiday travel prices alone, up 42.9% since last year, will undoubtedly make it difficult for families who live far away to gather as normal.
Thanksgiving is a quintessential, uniquely American holiday, which makes it doubly sad that some Americans are struggling to enjoy it.
IWF produced a Thanksgiving Dinner inflation tracker to monitor the prices of the popular household items Americans purchase for the holiday.