Looking a Gift Horse In The Mouth
In order to understand how team production works with the gift exchange, lets look at examples of gift exchange with varying levels of teamwork involved. As a general trend, an increase in teamwork and coordination usually increases the quality of the gift exchange.
Little to no teamwork
Birthday presents:
Birthday presents are perhaps the most simple and ubiquitous form of gift exchange. It's someone's birthday, so you give them something as a gift. There is often very little coordination involved, as people like when the gift is a surprise. This can result in shoddy gifts from uninformed gift-givers, but if you're lucky both parties are in sync and a great gift is given. This is more or less a complete crapshoot, and really just depends on how well you know the person.
Secret Santa:
Much like with birthday presents, Secret Santa involved very little coordination. In fact, part of the rule is that no one knows who has been picked to give a gift to whom, hence "secret" in the name. Without much regulation in the game, gifts will vary in quality and you will often have a wide variety of reactions.
Some teamwork
Christmas gifts:
Christmas gifts are like birthday presents, except it's Jesus's birthday and we're giving them to everyone except him. It's a raw deal for him, but good for everyone else. Unlike birthday presents, there is slightly less secrecy involved. Often times people will openly let others know what they are interested in for Christmas gifts, but there are still some gifts left open to surprise. Mom and Dad will coordinate with each other to figure out what to get for the kids, and the kids will coordinate with Mom and Dad to figure out what to get for each other. Often the gifts are better matches for the people involved because of the added level of coordination and teamwork.
Medium teamwork
Wedding presents:
Because of the fear of duplication in wedding gifts (no one needs four blenders), many weddings incorporate a gift registry, wherein wedding guests can see what items have already been purchased for the lucky couple. It's a very coordinated and efficient method, but does not prevent uninformed are otherwise terrible gifts, unless two people were planning on getting the couple one of those singing wall fish.
Heavy teamwork
Amazon wishlist:
The Amazon wishlist is perhaps the most coordinated way to exchange gifts. You just make a big list of all of the products that you want as a gift, and then send the link out to people. They are free to buy as much or as little of it as they feel comfortable, and they can rest assured that you'll enjoy what they bought you because you literally picked out every single item. If everyone had an Amazon wishlist, there would never be a bad gift again. Due to the rise in worldwide happiness, all wars would end and world peace would be achieved. Thanks, Amazon.
This blog post sponsored by Amazon™.
It turns out that economists are actually Scrooges. You might enjoy at least the concept of this paper, The Deadweight Loss of Christmas. More seriously, the actual giving of gifts in the office, on birthdays or the Secret Santa, seems to me either simply benign or perhaps a little bit too much depending on whether there can be humor attached. Giving something of significant monetary value is awkward, however. Here are a couple of instances that I am aware of for you to consider. When somebody retires at the U of I, there is often a party for that and gifts given then. Why we do that at the end of the work relationship and not at the beginning, I'm not sure, but that is the tradition. When I started my job as Associate Dean in the College of Business, I did receive flowers from the Dean. That was charming and the only time I have ever received flowers as a gift.
ReplyDeleteTruthfully, we are studying the giving of gifts in kind, meaning doing something that is work related and thus raises organization output, but that is not rewarded in any way. So I wonder why you wrote about explicit gifts and then tried to bring that back to the ideas in the prompt. Your post often surprise me in what you come up with . This one also surprised me. In your response you might explain how you came up with this one.
When we cover the topic of gift exchange, I can't help but imagine a group of stone-faced economists in business attire handing each other colorful wrapped presents and writing down the results. While we study the topic of gift exchange in the work environment, I wanted to cover the exchange of gifts in a casual environment as if it was a form of work, where the goal is to produce enjoyment in others at the smallest possible cost. Another class topic that factors into gift giving is risk aversion. I know that myself and others often hesitate to give more expensive and/or elaborate gifts because of the risk that the recipient might not enjoy it, making for a big deadweight loss between the two of us. One of the things I enjoy most about Economics is how some of the theories can be applied to areas outside of just markets and production. I have repeatedly taught my roommates of the concept of the tragedy of the commons and how it relates to our pile of dirty dishes, to the point where it has become an inside joke around the house. Tying gift exchange into the actual giving of presents seemed like a perfectly apropos pairing.
DeleteI love how you were able to break down the multi-layered anatomy of gift giving. The heavy team work one was my favorite. I use GiftWhale to manage my wish lists. In fact, it is the golden standard of wish list management platforms, and if you sign up today using referral code HOLDUP!, you will receive a 15% discount on the next item purchased through the platform! It is far superior to Amazon Wishlist, and really is in a league of its own!
ReplyDeleteIt is certainly interesting how you set this post up with the different ideas of gift exchange. However, I would say the level of coordination might vary if you go from person to person. I think as kids get older, the amount of coordination goes up when it comes to Christmas gifts. Kids will often just want money or will pick out a specific thing they want, meaning there's hardly any surprise. I still think kids can surprise parents based on less coordination, but in my family at least Christmas isn't really a surprise. I would say the same for my birthday. I usually come up with something I want and don't get surprised, especially as I have gotten older. However, everyone certainly has different experiences with that. Nice job!
ReplyDelete