St. Patrick’s Day by the Numbers!
- Nearly 35 million Americans claim some Irish heritage. That’s seven times the population of Ireland, around 4.58 million.
- Americans, Irish- and otherwise, will spend around $4.5 billion for various St Patrick’s day food, and festivities, at around $35 per person. Where does it all go?
- In the all-important food and beverage category, St. Pat’s celebrants will buy 26 billion pounds of corned beef and over 2 billion pounds of cabbage. Then, they will combine those, boil them to death and EAT them!
- Meanwhile, they will spend $435 million on beer alone, not all of it green.
Other popular expenditures?
- Irish-Americans will spend $24 million on lime-green dyed potted mums for Ma and Gran.
- We will send 7 million St. Patrick’s Day greeting cards, presumably with leprechauns on the front.
- And we will spend around a billion dollars on trips to Ireland.
Sounds like a blast. The good news is that you don’t have to be Irish, at least according to the stats. While Irish-Americans make up about 11% of the population, fully half of all Americans say that they will be partaking in the St. Pat’s festivities. So tilt a pint of the green stuff, but please do it responsibly! Thanks, and have a great St. Pat’s weekend!