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Yet the question remains: Why is Halloween the festival that is expanding now? We indulge in speculation: People (especially baby boomer parents) are more accepting of fantasy and play these days. There is no other nationwide occasion that allows people to indulge in a carnival atmosphere. The overworked, affluent folk who respond to Martha Stewart''s upscale homemaking advice are also receptive to the sprucing up of Halloween--and Halloween provides an unusual array of possibilities, from the creepy to the cuddly, for re-creating an idealized version of the holiday one remembers from childhood.

If festivals reveal something about the concerns of our culture, we have to wonder about the meaning of this new emphasis on Halloween. What does it tell us about Americans at the turn of the 21st century?Well, perhaps not all that much. In a consumer culture that is now enjoying a sustained period of prosperity, the expanded celebration of Halloween may simply reveal that Americans have found another way to spend money. Those cute witch-hat lights and glass Halloween ornaments sell because somebody has the money to make them and somebody else has the money to buy them. Leigh Schmidt of Princeton University, who has studied the development of holidays and their intimate connection to commercial forces, says that the market always works to expand and extend holidays, encouraging more elaborate ways to celebrate.

According to the National Retail Federation (NRF), Halloween is now a $5 billion industry, and the American Express Retail Index reported that consumers spent an average of $98 last year on the holiday, an increase of 21% from 1998. In fact, Halloween''s popularity with consumers has grown consistently for the past two years.Halloween, however, falls on a Tuesday this year, so the weekday event may lack the drawing power of the past three years when it fell on the more festive weekend. Sales for 2000 aren''t expected to increase and will likely remain flat due to the timing, but retailers seem not to be deterred as they focus on capturing market share to boost the Halloween business.

Find infant Halloween costumes right here! We've got a truly great selection of infant Halloween costumes online!

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