With the economy inching out of recession, you would think that many households, especially those without an employed adult in them would be quite frugal this time of year. According to various surveys, from past and present years, American's are expected to pull $50 billion out of their wallets on black friday, November 25th, this year. In addition to this, there will also be close to 210 million shoppers making purchases sometime during the day on Friday, regardless of if it be online through websites like Amazon, or at shopping malls throughout the country. That equates to approximately $375 per person who does venture to shop on this Black Friday.

Now, let's look at how this $50 billion stacks up against the US national debt, which is currently just over $15 trillion. Let's just say that is instead of spending money on every Black Friday, the population were to donate it all to the US Government to pay down our debts. It would take 300 Black Fridays to pay off.

That's quite crazy when you put it like that. I suppose if some of the huge corporations with big bank balances were to donate a large % of their income from Black Friday, this could make a huge difference to the defecit. But I suppose the corporations themselves would need some sort of direct incentive.