Black Friday

The fourth Thursday in November is Thanksgiving in the U.S., the equivalent of our Chuseok. Family members gather, even from out-of-town, to eat turkey and give thanks. The day after Thanksgiving, “Black Friday,” is the beginning of the biggest shopping season of the year in the U.S. “Black Friday” used to be police terminology referring to traffic congestion on the day after Thanksgiving in the 1960s. But these days, it refers more to corporations turning their finances to profit margins after they unload their inventory.

Black Friday’s shopping fever is comparable to our Chuseok’s return-home frenzy. It is not uncommon to see people camping out overnight, waiting for stores to open. Retail stores such as Target and Best Buy open their doors at 12:01 AM on Friday so that people can shop after their Thanksgiving dinners. Most retail stores advertise sale items but some stores have surprise sales as well, on a limited basis. Corporations make their market estimations for the rest of the year and the next year based on the sales on Black Friday. According to ShopperTrak, a data analysis agency, sales increased by 6.6 percent compared to last year and were the highest since 2007.

There were multiple unfortunate incidents on Black Friday, as if reflecting the economic hardship suffered by the people. In Los Angeles, a woman in her 30s pepper sprayed other shoppers to buy an X-Box at a Wal-Mart, injuring dozens. At a Target in South Charleston, West Virginia, a man in his 60s collapsed due to cardiac arrest while shopping and died — no one helped him. It looked like a war zone with no shame or moral standards rather than shopping.

Due to the lack of cultural heritage, shopping is some kind of national sport for Americans. We spend within our paychecks, but Americans anticipate their income and spend on credit. Therefore, for Americans, Black Friday is a difficult temptation to turn down. But there is no reason to pity their shopping frenzy. Professor Daniel Altman at New York University’s Stern School of Business chose “the revival of the U.S.” as the first of the 12 trends that will change the fate of the world economy, supporting his argument with Americans’ spending power. The world economy runs because we have Americans who will shop even on credit.