Author:  Tricia Juhn

Every end of year shoppers gear up for the Christmas season. Retailers large and small wait anxiously for the days between Thanksgiving and New Year's because sales during the holiday season often represent 25 to 50 percent of total earnings for the year.

Papa Noel earns in dollars
In 2005 Latin Americans working abroad sent some $60 billion dollars home to Latin America and the Caribbean. $40 billion of that originated in the United States; the remainder split between other developing and developed countries. Nearly half of that went to Mexico alone.