Min Wage Job to buy Christmas Presents.

[Airforcekid]

I considered getting a job to buy presents for my family.
I wanted to get the following:
2 iPod Nanos 8gbs For sister dad
1 Classic For me
1 Touch 8gb For grandparents
1 MacBook For me
1 MacBook Air For my mom
The price is a little below $5,000
I know it will take longer than the 25th but I told them if they wait they will get better gifts and they liked the idea. Also I will cut my stuff out if it dosent look good I realy need to upgrade from my powerbook G3 and Suffle though. Any thoughts or suggestions?

 

[dukebound85]

min wage is like 7/hr (here in CO)

assume you make 5/hr after taxes

so you need to work 1000hrs about

full time is 40hrs/wk

so 25 weeks about at full time (if you are a student, chances are you wont work full time either)

or over 6 months JUST to buy the stuff you listed and nothing else (such as gas,insurance, food, movies, etc) if working 40hrs/week

id scale down on the gifts....afterall it's the thought that counts

 

[Airforcekid]

I just now thought of getting insted of the Air the dell 9 mini. That would cut it down a lot. Any other alternatives?

 

[Mr$Whale]

I considered getting a job to buy presents for my family.
I wanted to get the following:
2 iPod Nanos 8gbs For sister dad
1 Classic For me
1 Touch 8gb For grandparents
1 MacBook For me
1 MacBook Air For my mom
The price is a little below $5,000
I know it will take longer than the 25th but I told them if they wait they will get better gifts and they liked the idea. Also I will cut my stuff out if it dosent look good I realy need to upgrade from my powerbook G3 and Suffle though. Any thoughts or suggestions?

I agree with the above poster. That's an awful lot of money and expensive stuff for Christmas. It's really thoughtful of you to want to treat them so nicely, but maybe you should consider something else. I doubt your mom really expects an Air from you for Xmasand would much rather see that money put to use for school or for yourself. Same with the grandparents and your dad.

Gifts aren't about how much they cost or how awesome they are. The best gifts are thoughtful ones that maybe don't sit directly on the shelf. One of my favorite gifts was a little treasure hunt for a bunch of smaller stuff, but I remember getting a bunch of clues and they all tied back to certain memories or events for me and the gf. Dinner or even a family outing to theater/sports game/etc might be a great idea that way everyone can enjoy it together!

 

[mkrishnan]

I tend to agree, too... It's very sweet of you to want to buy such fancy gifts, but if you're at an age/position where you'd have to work a thousand hours at minimum wage to earn your gifts, you have no business spending that much on gifts. You should pare it down a lot more than just replacing the MBA with a Dell.

Try to come up with a list of gifts for everyone that costs ... just a few hundred dollars. Not a few thousand dollars.

P.S. Assuming that you have a good, decent family... also be prepared that, if you don't listen to us, and you do somehow save thousands of dollars and spend it on presents for the family between now and Christmas, there's a pretty high (99%) chance that you won't get the response that you're looking for. They're going to be mad at you -- I mean not, pissed, but if your family are good people, they're going to be upset that you spent months spending all your time working instead of studying or spending time with them, and they're quite possibly going to see your spending as wasteful rather than generous.

 

[rydix]

are you kidding? just get a job at the apple store when they start hiring for seasonal. you'll be making eleven dollars an hour and get 25% off. make a friend in the store and have them refer you, the applications get put in a different folder that actually get looked at.

it's not quite as hard as you think to get a job there, i absolutely loved it.

 

[jTreu]

Thats a lot of money, I would consider rethinking your gifts to something a little more do-able without killing yourself.

 

[sonia1234321]

Maybe you should wait a bit before buying gifts for yourself

And a good cheap alternative to the MBA is the Acer Aspire One!

Do your grandparents really need an iPod Touch?

 

[JML42691]

I am going to say to slim down on just about everything. After all, it is the thought that counts. I would go for smaller/more cheaply priced gifts with more meaning, I think people would appreciate that a lot more.

 

[Airforcekid]

are you kidding? just get a job at the apple store when they start hiring for seasonal. you'll be making eleven dollars an hour and get 25% off. make a friend in the store and have them refer you, the applications get put in a different folder that actually get looked at.

it's not quite as hard as you think to get a job there, i absolutely loved it.

That is my dream college job! I didnt know it was 25 wow.