Last year, we recommended several DIY Halloween costume ideas for you, the cosmopolitan, always-connected participant in the new global economy. These included: Brexiteer, Davos Man, Mark Zuckerberg, and Sexy Mark Zuckerberg.
It’s a new year, and the world has changed. Fortunately for Halloween revelers, this year is even spookier than the last. So we’ve updated our list of ideas with costumes that say “global economy 2017.”
Bitcoin miner: Don a hard hat and headlamp and tape a pencil to a pickaxe. (You will use the pencil-pickaxe to solve math equations.)
Steve Bannon: Wear between two and 37 button-down shirts, layered on top of each other. The pants should be yoga pants. Top it off with a blazer.
Equifax: Tape a piece of paper to your chest containing your: government ID number, mother’s maiden name, credit card number (with security code and expiration date), last three addresses, date of birth, city of birth, time of birth, mother’s time of birth, desired time of birth for any future children, bank account details, name of your first pet, signature, and Twitter password.
Index fund: Dress as the exact average of all the most popular Halloween costumes—think witch’s hat over a Batman mask, draped in a ghost sheet, with a clown nose. Uninspired but effective.
Robo-adviser: Wear a chrome-tinged pinstripe suit and ask everyone incredibly detailed questions about their lifestyle, investment risk tolerance, and future plans. Conclude all of these conversations by suggesting that they meet your friend, the index fund.
Travis Kalanick (2.0): Take an Uber to your Halloween party. Compliment your driver and tip him $20. Tell every woman at the party you are there to support her. Mention your best friend, Dara. This is the new you. This is how you will return to power. You are Steve Jobs-ing it.
Internet troll: Works best if you are a man. Don’t shower between now and Halloween. Carry a sign containing provocative “truths” like “all lives matter” or “feminists hate men.” Everyone will think you are very smart.
Russian internet troll: Same as above, except you are a bot.
Cyclically adjusted price-to-earnings ratio: Get up on the tallest stilts you can find and hold a sign that says “THIS TIME IS DIFFERENT.”
Machine learning: Ask a friend with a dog to give you a picture of their dog. Ask everyone at a Halloween party whether this picture is or is not of a dog. Repeat until you are reasonably certain that the picture is, in fact, of a dog.
Protectionism: Bring your own drinks, food, friends, refrigerator, space heater, wine glasses, shot glasses, bathroom, and hand soap. Don’t use or engage with anything or anyone you did not bring yourself. Maybe carry a shield, too.
Central bank tapering: Dress as Janet Yellen, Mario Draghi, Mark Carney, or Haruhiko Kuroda. Over the course of the evening, take progressively smaller servings from the punchbowl.
iPhone X notch: Wear a black winter cap and pull it down so that it covers your face. (Tip: This will make it impossible to eat or drink normally, so you will need to fashion a dongle-tube that can convert for the available input.)
ICO: In exchange for drinks and candy, give people tokens that represent the right to acquire future drinks and candy, on the blockchain. Leave the party early and never speak to any of them again.
Pumpkin spice latte: Douse yourself in two cans of spray-tan and empty a full bottle of whipped cream on your head. (Don’t use any actual pumpkin.)
Populism: Dress as whatever the majority of partygoers say you should dress as (no matter what).
Brexit negotiations: This is a two-person deal—one dresses in French garb (beret, baguette under arm) and the other in a British getup (bowler hat, tweed). The French person leads the Brit around the party all night in a headlock.
Snapchat dancing hotdog: Just buy this one directly.
Donald Trump: See “Pumpkin spice latte.”
Jeff Bezos: Fly a drone around and deliver things to people near-instantly. “This is so convenient!” everyone will say. But only you know they will soon become unwilling to get anything themselves, leaving you in total control.
Amazon Alexa: Same as above, except you are a bot.
19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China: Don the official dark suit of the Chinese Communist Party. Tie color: red.
Goop: Dress in only clay and undergarments. You can pull it off, because you spent the last few days on a master cleanse.
Down round: Carry a bucket of candy and insist that people buy pieces at your very reasonable prices: $5 for a mini-Snickers, $7 for peanut M&Ms. Vehemently deny rumors that you sold the same candy at another party for twice as much. People are desperate to buy your candy now. There is definitely nothing wrong with it.
The nuclear codes: Works best if you are in a toxic relationship with someone who is among those dressed as Donald Trump.
Yahoo: Dress as the person everybody thought had moved out of town.
WannaCry: Carry handcuffs to lock up other people at the party, especially anyone dressed as a doctor. Wear a sign that says, “I accept bitcoin.” Hope no one discovers vodka is your kill switch.
Lee Sedol: Dedicate your entire life to mastering the game of Go, a game of such complexity that it has for millennia tested the limits of the human mind.
AlphaGo: Same as above, except one month instead of a lifetime, and you are a bot.
The VIX: Eat a huge, carb-heavy meal before your party so you’re nice and sleepy. Move as slowly as possible, commenting frequently that “it’s awfully quiet in here.”
Facebook Explore feed: You and a group of friends will together go as just a few of the zany characters likely to appear in your Facebook Explore feed, like the pig who is living large, or the woman who went from a size 22 to a size 10 and hated it, or the Explosive Clinton-Uranium Deal, or the chicken that plays piano.
Uber driver: Wait why are you dressing up for Halloween? People are drunk, demand is high, surge pricing is off the charts! You think you get to go to a party?
Self-driving car: Same as above, except you are a bot.