Thanksgiving 2023: The Price of Thanksgiving Dinner in Bitcoin Over the Last Decade

Depending on where you were born, Thanksgiving is either the most exciting and cherished day of the year or simply the fourth Thursday of November. The American holiday is a feast for the senses, imbued with dreamy wafts of turkey, pumpkin pie, and a pinch of good, old-fashioned gratitude.

While Thanksgiving Day has been a consistent and reliable staple of North American culture, Bitcoin has been much more volatile. Outrageous claim here, but Bitcoin (BTC) and its financial rollercoaster have probably caused more Thanksgiving arguments than any other financial asset over the last 10 years.

Need proof? Just ask someone who convinced their parents to put their retirement savings into BTC in November 2021.

Needless to say, the BTC/THANKSGIVING chart looks pretty favorable for Bitcoin over time. While Thanksgiving seems to get more expensive every year, food prices and inflation haven’t quite been able to keep up with Bitcoin over the last decade. 

This begs the question. How much has Thanksgiving dinner cost in BTC over the last decade?

Our Bitcoin/Thanksgiving Pricing Strategy

A word to the wise: I’m not a genius mathematician. Calculating the cost of a standard Thanksgiving meal comes with more variables than a pilgrim could shake a stuffing-filled turkey leg at. Not every family eats the same way, has access to the same ingredients, or invites every member of the extended family.

For the sake of simplicity, let’s assume that every single Thanksgiving dinner over the last decade has consisted of the same dishes and the same number of people. Then, we’ll take the price of those ingredients and compare them against the price of Bitcoin on the fourth Thursday of November every year.

“But what about inflation?! The USD isn’t worth anywhere near as much as it was 10 years ago!”

Don’t worry, I’ve thought of that too.

Let’s break down the individual pieces of the DailyCoin Thanksgiving formula. 

Average Cost of Thanksgiving

Plot twist, I’m not from North America. Apart from roast turkey and pumpkin pie, I can’t tell you what to expect to see on a Thanksgiving table. Sorry George Washington. 

Fortunately, the American Farm Bureau Federation has done the heavy lifting and given the uninitiated (me) a comprehensive list of what a group of 10 would normally eat during this beloved national holiday. 

Let’s take a look at our ingredients list:

Again, I have to thank the American Farm Bureau for compiling a list of what all these ingredients have cost the average consumer every year since 1986. Going forward, the Farm Bureau’s pricing will be used for each year’s BTC pricing analysis.

Price of Bitcoin

Perhaps the easiest part of this formula is finding the price of BTC. While every crypto exchange generally trades BTC at a slightly different price, aggregators like CoinMarketCap give us historical records for every day of the year, all the way back to 2010.

This makes finding the price of Thanksgiving dinner in BTC rather simple. We’ll take Farm Bureau’s estimated cost of Thanksgiving each year and divide it by the opening price of Bitcoin on the fourth Thursday of November of that same year. 

Adjusted for Inflation

This is where things get a bit more tricky. As we know all too well, inflation rates in the US have exploded since 2020, going from a steady 0.5-1.5% rate to over 7%. 

To factor the rate of inflation into our formula, we’ll simply add each year’s inflation rate to the price of Thanksgiving dinner from the previous year. This way, we’ll be able to compare the ‘true value’ of each meal against the year before it using a CPI Inflation Calculator.

The Perfect Formula?

This leaves us with a relatively simple formula. 

The price of Thanksgiving Dinner in BTC = 

(Farm Bureau’s Average 10-Person Meal Each Year X That Year’s Inflation Rate) / Price of BTC on the 4th Thursday of November.

Is this a perfect metric for measuring the value of Thanksgiving? Absolutely not! As mentioned, not everyone eats the same generic meal. There are a lot more dietary requirements that need to be factored in that Franklin D. Roosevelt, President Abraham Lincoln, and the gang didn’t need to think about.

While the formula isn’t perfect, it works off what the average Thanksgiving dinner looks like across the United States.

A Decade of Bitcoin Thanksgivings

Enough pleasantries around the table. Let’s dig in!

In a shocking twist, the American Farm Bureau estimates that the price of Thanksgiving is actually down from last year’s. At the time of writing, BTC is valued at around $36,284, meaning that you can feed the family this year for as little as 0.0017 BTC.

To no one’s great surprise, the best year to fund your Thanksgiving dinner with Bitcoin was 2021. In fact, 2021 was also the best year to use BTC for your Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and Christmas shopping.

It was something of a double-edged sword however, given that 2021 was also the year that you were most likely to convince your whole family to go all in on Bitcoin. I hope your loved ones forgave you in time for Thanksgiving 2022 after BTC plunged back to $16,000 and lost 70% of its value.

On the Flipside

• Amidst the complexity and noise of financial markets, inflation, and the rising cost of food prices around the world, don’t forget that Thanksgiving is a national holiday built around gratitude. 
• Just like the pilgrims and native Americans did during the first Thanksgiving, make peace with the fact that you’ll need to take a day away from the charts and enjoy a Thanksgiving feast with your loved ones. 

Why This Matters

Holidays throughout the year give us timely reminders of the things that are truly important in our lives. As the holiday season gets into swing, remember that Bitcoin will still be there when you get back. 

Don’t go scurrying off to check crypto market prices in secret while everyone else is sharing a moment together.

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