Thread: Halloween just got a financial hit

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Well, time to vent slightly. I live in NY, and have been luckily enough at 27 to be working for the state, which can be hard to get into. And so far it has absolutely made life easier, financially wise at least. Until now, out state economy is a mess, and out governor is a hack. Because they can't come up with a budget that everyone can agree at, we have run out of money.

So the Governor has enstated mandatory 1/5 furloughs for all employees. Which is one day off a week with out pay. Which for me makes $500 less a month I have coming in. Some of that money was what I spend on Halloween building supplies and what not, so I don't know when I'll be able to work on Halloween stuff.

The furlough last until the bugget is passed, and at least 8 weeks I believe, aweseome.

On top of that, the next day our lovely governor gave 5 of his staff members rasies.

Well that is all, I just wanted to vent a little.

I hear ya, and I'm sorry to hear it.

You aren't alone. A lot of us are in the same boat.

Take heart, though; there are a few silver linings here.

For one thing, working for the state at your age is an amazing advantage. I know people in their forties, veterans with years of experience who can't get on at their local government level. The security and the benefits of working for the state are hard-won and well worth holding on to. It may not pay as much as the private sector, but it's a lot safer.

Two, (and the more important point) the modern Halloween celebration in America was born in the Great Depression. The holiday is older, yes, but the formal acceptance of the festival, it's appearance on the mainstream calendar of the United States, that stuff dates to the 1930's.

Candy was homemade, and cookies, popcorn balls, dipped apples, lemon drops, cinnamon twists and saltwater taffy were the prime treats because they could be made in the kitchen.
Costumes were sewn at home, and were often the first foray into the world of sewing and tailoring by a wide number of women and not a few men.
Masks were made with paper mache and painted.
Faces were smeared with burnt cork or dusted with flour.
Pumpkins were grown - buying would have been seen as needlessly extravagant.
Paper decorations were made, such as mache figurines, cardboard silhouettes and ribbons to hang from the ceiling.

Don't think for a second you need to buy anything other than glue, flour, duct tape and paint. Have you noticed that the most original haunts and halloween homes are managed by people who don't buy props at all?
This is the year to consider what you can make and what you might want to learn to make.

Who knows?
You may find that when finances improve, you'll have neither the need nor the desire to ever spend large amounts of cash on Halloween ever again.
Either way, best of luck and keep on grinnin'.

So sorry to hear about your 1/5 work situation. Yet there are a lot of ways to decorate/celebrate Halloween that don't involve major outlays of $$$, as Spats has noted upthread. We had a really down year financially last year in our rental business, plus our daughter suddenly had NO paying job while struggling to complete an unpaid internship & write her master's thesis. Our usual Halloween $$$ went to pay her bills, needless to say. So for '09 we dragged out our old zombie props from storage, scaled the haunt down to the bone, still did the "Cans for Candy" thing Halloween night, & had a ball. Chin up- if there's any place to find ideas for a low cost/ homemade Halloween, HF is it!

Speaking of 1930s type Halloweens past- my great aunt told me that when she was growing up there were three costumes you could do for Halloween: A ghost (old sheet with eyeholes), a hobo (old shirt, burnt cork on face, bundle on stick), or your pajamas.

I hear ya man. The economy is stickin it to all of us.

Empty, I feel your pain. I work for county government and have had to take an unpaid day off each month since January. I also understand the political angle since our predicament is due in large part to the drunken spending habits of certain persons in charge...who shall not be named on the off-chance either of them have the one redeeming feature of being a Halloween fanatic. I agree with Spats - once your situation improves you may find you won't need to spend as much haunt money.

still looking for a job myself, got layed off in December. I hear ya on not being able to get stuff, though Id be happy with at least having a job. Id do more about those people getting raises, that shouldnt be occurring. The only way I can think of that happening is if they got rid of people and made those others assume the responsibility, therefore giving them a raise to cover the additional burden to their work loads.

That's exactly what happened. When our governor and his staff started to get investigated, some people left, so other people stepped up and took their jobs, therefor he gave them raises. But when he made us get rid of our consultants and interns, I took on the job of three people, and did not get a raise. He just announced that rescinded the raises for the time being. It's a big mess.

I've only been haunting for three years, and I'm not that big and I'm doing my best to keep cost down anyways, so hopefully I can find a way to the three big things I want to do this year anyway. Thanks for the support, and I'm sorry for everyones hard time and I know that we all think about Halloween, and do stuff for it to sometimes distract us from lifes misgivings.

I know how you feel we have been this way at work for the past year and a half and it has hurt my halloween building plans big time. I am just lucky to still have a job some of my friends have been out of work for over a year.

The world is in a tough spot, and some radical changes need to happen to fix it, or at least make it better, not sure what those changes are though

Sorry to hear about your pay cut. I guess it's better than being laid off, though.
It's too bad you've got a governor that got the job only because the REAL governor was caught in a hooker scandal. That's probably what the money saved is going for--to pay off his hooker bills.
I hope this is all a temporary thing and you get your fifth day of work and pay back!.