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WASHINGTON LETTER Aug-8-2008 (960 words) Backgrounder and analysis. With photos and graphic. xxxn
Back-to-school supplies and demands: High prices are testing parents
By Carol Zimmermann
Catholic News Service
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- The rising cost of back-to-school supplies is forcing parents across the country to do the math before they head to the store.
Parents -- already coping with the high cost of food and gas -- are now getting hit hard with a school-supply price tag that increases each year as items on the list become more high tech than the traditional pens, pencils, glue and notebooks.
In response, parents are doing their homework. They're looking for sales or heading to discount stores. Others are relying on sales-tax holidays or seeking donated items from charity groups. According to a trade organization report, one-fifth of U.S. parents set aside a portion of this year's federal stimulus check specifically for school purchases.
Back-to-school shopping, the second-biggest shopping season after Christmas, is expected this year to run about $594 per family (including electronics and clothing), up from last year's $563, according to the National Retail Federation, a trade group based in Washington.
In its annual report released in July, the group noted that back-to-school spending for students in kindergarten through 12th grade this year is expected to reach $20.1 billion. Spending is projected to increase for elementary and high school students, but it is expected to go down for college students, from last year's $641 per student to $599 this year.
It's estimated that overall spending for students this year will be $31.2 billion.
Even though that kind of money could buy a lot of protractors, retailers are worried they will feel the pinch with parents tightening their spending budgets in today's tight economy. The overall school-supply spending estimate includes an expected 2.5 percent increase over last year, but it's the lowest increase in at least five years, according to the trade group.
Stores are trying to lure parents with markdowns on basic school items, free shipping and advertisements that compare the relatively inexpensive cost of school supplies to the high cost of gas and groceries.
Several state legislatures also have stepped in to offset costs by approving sales-tax holidays specifically for school-related purchases. Currently 16 states and the District of Columbia offer tax-free shopping days specifically for school items. During these days, usually in August, customers can purchase clothes, shoes, supplies and computers without paying state sales taxes.
New York held the first back-to-school tax holiday in 1997. Massachusetts, Vermont and West Virginia joined in this year. Not all legislators favor the measure since it means a loss of state revenue.
And for many people, the markdowns, sales and tax-free shopping days don't help enough.
Catholic Charities agencies sponsor back-to-school drives to collect items for those in need.
These days such drives in cities and rural areas go beyond collecting crayons and notebooks to collecting money for clothes or shoe vouchers.
Catholic Charities in the Diocese of Joliet, Ill., has been sponsoring back-to-school drives for nearly 20 years after a single mother asked for help with school supplies for her children.
Since that initial drive, the agency has sponsored as many as four annual school fairs. This year it was holding two fairs Aug. 6-7; they were expected to provide school supplies to about 8,000 children.
At the fairs, students from low-income families are given backpacks full of supplies based on school districts' lists of what they will need. They also can receive health services such as immunizations, vision exams and dental cleanings while their parents can get information on voter registration, employment, child care, and for the first time credit counseling.
"It's a one-stop shop of health and human services," said Lorri Nagle, director of development for the Joliet Catholic Charities, adding that "each year we serve more and more people."
Leonor Alvarado, director of the emergency food pantry at the St. Vincent de Paul Center in Porterville, Calif., knows full well about the increased need for services, based on the influx she has seen at the pantry in recent months. As a child of a farmworker family, she also knows what it's like to not be able to afford school items.
That's why she instituted the backpack drive at the center sponsored by Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Fresno, Calif.
"I see people coming who don't have money to buy food, so how will they have money for their kids' school supplies, especially when they have five or six kids?" she said.
"With the economy and gas prices, it's either food or gas," she told Catholic News Service Aug. 7. She also said it is a self-esteem issue for children who don't have new markers or clothes when the school year begins.
Not all students face the same back-to-school worries, though. While some families can't afford basic items, other students might balk at lacking a cell phone. Increasingly, cell phones -- although not school-required items -- have been finding their way onto school shopping lists.
According to the Nielsen Co., which tracks consumer habits, 46 percent of 8- to 12-year-olds and 80 percent of teenagers own cell phones.
"For kids today, mobile phones have become just as much a part of their daily school life as pens and pencils," said James Russo, the group's vice president of marketing.
"Going back to school without a phone is unthinkable for many young people, who consider it their lifeline," he added.
But some things are the same for tech-savvy youths and parents struggling to make ends meet. The traditional school-lunch staple -- the peanut butter and jelly sandwich -- is apparently still in favor.
According to a Nielsen press release, U.S. consumers are expected to spend more than $87 million on peanut butter and nearly $13 million on jelly during the first four weeks of school.
END
Copyright (c) 2008 Catholic News Service/USCCB. All rights reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed.
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