Resist the urge to impress family members with your purchasing power and instead give them only what they can afford to give you. Avoid luxury goods, for example, or other items redolent of leisure. Choose, instead, gifts that encourage productive labour. Hand tools, say, or cookbooks. Obviously your gift needs to say, “I love you,” but it also needs to say, “The income gap within the family isn’t going to be shrinking from my end.”
A funny look at how to handle poor relatives at Christmas. Or at least I hope it’s meant as humour.