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Breaking Down The Twelve Days Of Christmas

PITTSBURGH (NewsRadio1020 KDKA) - A partridge in a pear tree costs how much? PNC Bank is out with their 12 days of Christmas index mapping out the cost of each item in the song.

Chris Jordheim, with PNC Wealth Management, spoke with Bill Rehkopf on the KDKA Afternoon News and broke down the cost of each item in the classic song and how much the price has changed since last year. According the the index across the board the total cost of the 12 days are up about 1%.

"It's a little counter intuitive you think it would go up more than that," Jordheim said, "A lot of it is impacted by the things like the decrease in gas prices so transporting a lot of the items has gone down. One of the only things that has gone up dramatically would be for instance the cost of grain to feed the various animals."

Typically as noted in the index, the prices reflects the rate of inflation which this year is 1.7% so it's pretty close. This year 8 out of the 12 items stayed the same price as last year but items like the geese of laying are up over 70%.

"That comes down to supply and demand. It's impacted the same as a lot of the other animals where feed grain would play a part but, that's surprisingly a large increase versus say the four calling birds or the turtle doves," Jordheim said.

The amount of research that goes into this index is extensive but, how do they gather all their information to price out  the items from this song.

"A lot of the data we got as far as the National Aviary, we got the price for the doves and swans. The partridge we got from a national game bird supplier and the gold rings from a national jewelry seller," Jordheim explained, "Some of the more exotic ones we went to Philadelphia for the ladies dancing and Lords of leaping we got the price from the Pennsylvania Ballet Company."

The prices on the index range from about $7,500 for the ladies dancing to just $58 for the maids of milking. So what is the total for all the gifts? $27,673.21 but if you purchase each item the number of times the songs suggests it would cost you a whopping $116,273.06.

Be sure to check out the Christmas Price Index from PNC.

You can also listen to the whole interview here now.

12 days of Christmas

Tune into the KDKA Afternoon News weekdays 3-7pm.

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