The Witch Economy Is Booming

Speaker 2 My favorite witch, don't we all have one? Is probably Hermione from Harry Potter.

Speaker 3 It's Leviosa, not Leviosa.

Speaker 2 But there is a witch for every personality. There's the kooky sisters of Hocus Pocus.
I put a spell on you.

Speaker 2 And now you're mine.

Speaker 2 Or for our more sophisticated listeners, listeners, how about the three witches in Shakespeare's Macbeth?

Speaker 4 Fair is foul and foul is fair. Hover through the fog and filthy air.

Speaker 2 For the most part, witches are known to be scary, nightmarish. And this has had some very real consequences throughout history.

Speaker 2 Tens of thousands of people, mostly women, have been burned at the stake or otherwise executed for being accused of witchcraft.

Speaker 2 But today, in this economy, witchcraft is back.

Speaker 6 It seems like the business of witchcraft is pretty mainstream at this point. I think people are really interested in magic as a whole.

Speaker 2 My colleague Javi Lieber recently wrote about witches, and she says that these days, you don't need to go into the deep dark woods or to Hogwarts to find one. Just like everyone else, they're online.

Speaker 6 They are on Instagram or Shopify or TikTok, but I think Etsy is really the go-to.

Speaker 7 I hired an Etsy witch and it 100% worked. And here is my true story.

Speaker 2 Yesterday morning at 8 a.m., I paid an Etsy witch. She casted four spells for me.

Speaker 9 If I could have someone cast a spell to hopefully speed my manifestations and my wishes and my dreams along, I'm here for it.

Speaker 6 I paid $14

Speaker 5 and it was the best $14 I've spent.

Speaker 2 Hashtag Etsy Witch has become a viral trend. These online witches are making their magical services available to anyone willing to pay for them.

Speaker 5 Want a boyfriend?

Speaker 4 Or a job?

Speaker 2 Or a clear sky on your wedding day? There's a spell for that.

Speaker 6 If you go onto Etsy, you will just find like thousands and thousands of witches or people who say that they're witches and they are selling all sorts of like spells, enchantments, good luck charms, etc.

Speaker 6 for all sorts of prices. It looks like it's a witch's market.

Speaker 2 Welcome to The Journal, our show about money, business, and power. I'm Jessica Mendoza.
It's Friday, October 31st.

Speaker 2 Coming up on the show: why it pays to be a witch.

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Speaker 2 In thinking about the business of witchcraft, one of my first questions was, who is actually paying for these spells? So I talked to Tatiana Fernandez.

Speaker 2 She's 33, lives in Los Angeles, and works in social media. And for a long time, she, like me, was witch curious.

Speaker 15 I was raised in the air of like the craft and teen witch and like yeah i've always wanted to be a witch same i'm also scared

Speaker 14 everyone's like whatever you do comes back to you in threes and i'm like okay i'm not gonna do any of it

Speaker 12 well can you tell us what led you to buy your first spell I started a job last year in like the middle of summer, so 2024, and then I got laid off from it in March of 2025.

Speaker 2 I'm sorry.

Speaker 14 Like, I was so confident just because like I've always gotten so many replies from like any job applications that I put out.

Speaker 12 Recruiters have always been hitting me up.

Speaker 17 I've never struggled to get a job ever in my career.

Speaker 2 But to her surprise and disappointment, the weeks became months and still no jobs were coming through.

Speaker 16 It was really, it was tough.

Speaker 14 putting out so many applications out there, endlessly fixing my resume, just not getting any replies back.

Speaker 12 After two months or so is like when I started kind of getting really antsy and anxious about it.

Speaker 4 Yeah.

Speaker 15 In this country, we only get unemployment for like X amount of months.

Speaker 14 So I'm like, the time is ticking for sure.

Speaker 2 Tatiana was getting desperate. Finally, she thought, why not? She gave in to her witch curiosity and bought a spell, paying a witch $4.95 on the online marketplace Etsy.

Speaker 14 So I was like, you know what? I've been already praying about it.

Speaker 15 Like, what would some, you know, a little bit of reinforcement?

Speaker 5 that wouldn't hurt. And so I was like, you know what?

Speaker 17 It's $5.

Speaker 17 I can spare the five bucks.

Speaker 5 I know I'm broke, but not that broke yet. Okay.

Speaker 2 So you, in your head, you're like, well, why not get a little reinforcement? How did you decide which spell, who to reach out to, which, which, which, which?

Speaker 16 It's funny because for this, I kind of was just like, whatever, I'm just going to go on Etsy and whoever's really winning the SEO ranks here is going to get my, my five bucks.

Speaker 5 And so like, I think I clicked probably like the first one and i was like okay he's got good reviews and like it was specifically a career spell because he had different offerings at the time and i was like all right let's give it a go

Speaker 2 here's what tatiana's five bucks got her first a message from the witch saying he had cast an initial career and job success spell for her and that he'd recast it every night for 30 days

Speaker 2 He also gave her some homework. He told her to write down on a piece of paper some symbols, which he called a sigil, and to keep it with her at all times.

Speaker 2 Tatiana did that and slipped the paper into her cell phone case.

Speaker 2 The witch also told her to get into a meditative state before she fell asleep that first night, which she did while thinking positive things about her job search.

Speaker 12 Okay, I can do this.

Speaker 14 Like, okay, I'm going to have a job and like I'm inviting this opportunity in.

Speaker 12 And that's exactly what I did that night.

Speaker 2 Reciting affirmations, meditating, positive thinking. These are pretty standard practices in the spellwork marketplace these days.
Here's my colleague Javi again.

Speaker 6 A lot of the people that I interviewed for my story were equating witchcraft with this concept of manifesting.

Speaker 6 You know, you envision a positive outcome or something that you want to happen, and then you just like march to it.

Speaker 6 So you are reciting, you know, these affirmations and you're doing things that sort of like get you to your goal.

Speaker 2 The rise of modern witchcraft coincides with a broader cultural interest in tarot, crystals, astrology, or what skeptics might call woo-woo.

Speaker 2 Javi says, Today's witchcraft is not all about positivity, though. You can also buy curses or hexes, though they're often more expensive.

Speaker 2 And some witches say they won't dabble in the dark arts for a client for ethical reasons.

Speaker 2 But it isn't necessarily the practice of black magic that can get a witch in double, double toil and trouble. It's website user policies.

Speaker 2 Etsy, where a lot of witches set up shop, technically doesn't allow the selling of spells.

Speaker 6 Etsy has a page of house rules where they say that they don't allow metaphysical services. So they don't allow spellcasting or something that will advertise a metaphysical outcome.

Speaker 6 And they specifically list attracting wealth, love,

Speaker 6 luck, more business, employment, relationship situations.

Speaker 6 So Etsy says outright that this stuff is not allowed.

Speaker 2 So how do all these thousands of witches

Speaker 2 get away with that?

Speaker 18 Yeah.

Speaker 6 So important to note, Etsy declined to comment for my story, but the witches that I spoke to did tell me that they all tell their customers that they can never promise an outcome.

Speaker 6 So just because you're buying a love spell does not mean you're actually going to get love.

Speaker 2 Javi also says that some witches will include a photo or a physical gift when customers buy a spell.

Speaker 18 They'll get a picture of like candles and crystals and like, you know, sometimes like a little poem, even though they're not really paying for the item, they're paying for the spell. Right.

Speaker 2 If you're not happy with the outcome of your spell, can you get a refund?

Speaker 6 No refunds, no exchanges.

Speaker 2 Ha, interesting.

Speaker 2 However, some witches will offer to recast a spell if the buyer feels like it hasn't worked after a period of time.

Speaker 2 How big has this industry gotten?

Speaker 6 Honestly, it's impossible to tell. Like I said, Etsy doesn't really condone this market.
And so, you know, they aren't really aggregating data about it.

Speaker 6 So getting an exact figure on this would be a little bit of magic.

Speaker 2 And there's certainly a lot of paying customers out there who want to believe in magic. Many of them are Gen Z or millennial women, like the spell buyer we talked to, Tatiana Fernandez.

Speaker 2 Tatiana says, things started to change in her job search after after she bought the spell from her witch.

Speaker 2 Did it work?

Speaker 5 Oh, yeah, it was wild.

Speaker 14 It was day and night. He told me, he's like, be patient.

Speaker 13 It takes about two weeks to kick in.

Speaker 13 And like, literally, two weeks after I started getting requests to interview, and I was kind of like, I have good jobs that I would like to take if I, any of these would be like a blessing.

Speaker 14 And I landed one of them.

Speaker 13 I actually had to like reject the other two kind of like in the whole process.

Speaker 17 Yeah.

Speaker 2 What made you feel like it was the spell and not something that you did or even coincidence?

Speaker 14 I honestly think it was the timing.

Speaker 13 Yeah. And like the fact that kind of to the T of like when he told me things would start working, they did.

Speaker 12 I have nothing but great things to say about it.

Speaker 19 After the break, hi, my name is Carissa and I'm 23. I am a witch.
Welcome to my home.

Speaker 2 We go to meet a witch.

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Speaker 11 It's about finding someone with the right skills and background who can move your business forward.

Speaker 10 And a good way to start your search is with Indeed Sponsored Jobs.

Speaker 11 It's one of the best ways to make your job post stand out and reach the candidates you're looking for faster.

Speaker 10 According to Indeed data, sponsored jobs posted directly on Indeed are 90% more likely to report a hire than non-sponsored jobs.

Speaker 11 Plus, there's no monthly subscriptions or long-term contracts.

Speaker 10 You're only paying for results.

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Speaker 2 Carissa Perez doesn't live in a gingerbread house in the woods. She lives in an apartment in Fremont, California.
And she doesn't own a black cat or a magic wand, but she does have a business card.

Speaker 2 It says, she's a witch.

Speaker 19 It says Bay Area Witch, spell work, products, readings, and it has my Instagram name so that people can find me.

Speaker 2 Carissa says she got into witchcraft because she was close to a pagan family growing up, but she's mostly a self-made witch.

Speaker 2 She's been reading spell books since high school, and she started her witch business four years ago.

Speaker 19 Like basil is really good for luck. Stinging needle, you can use that for cleansing, banishing.
Roses, good for love, self-love, things like that. Everything has its purposes.

Speaker 2 Carissa has another job. She also works at a pizza restaurant, but she says she can make up to $3,000 a month on witchcraft.
And that's helped her afford to live by herself for the first time.

Speaker 2 Her new apartment is where she practices her spell work.

Speaker 2 She gave one of her producers a tour of it.

Speaker 19 To start, this is one of my altars, first altars. I like to have it out here in front of the

Speaker 19 I do have a bunch of my products here. A lot of where I do.

Speaker 2 Carissa has three of what she calls altars in her home. Small tables filled with candles, shells, crystals, and herbs.

Speaker 19 These ones I make.

Speaker 2 Carissa offers spells for things like seduction and glamour, reconciliation, and new opportunities. And she charges between $35 and $120 for her spell work.

Speaker 19 So for this one, I am using as an example.

Speaker 19 With the candle, I always like to have the person's name on their written.

Speaker 2 Carissa sits at one of her altars where she starts to cast her most in-demand enchantment, which she calls under my spell.

Speaker 2 It's basically a love spell, meant to make her client more alluring to those around them.

Speaker 19 We'll open that one up.

Speaker 19 Just spreading it right on the candle.

Speaker 19 Perfect.

Speaker 2 Carissa lights a homemade candle in the shape of a woman's figure, which she douses in oils and herbs.

Speaker 19 And what I like to say is now we are in session.

Speaker 2 Carissa reads off the words of the spell.

Speaker 19 Their energy flows like water, clear, calm, and irresistible.

Speaker 19 They are a mirror of beauty and enchantment.

Speaker 2 Then she concentrates on the candle's flame.

Speaker 19 It's just having truly that patience with it and just genuinely being present with it the whole time.

Speaker 2 When the candle has burned all the way through, the ritual is over.

Speaker 19 To end it, I just kind of, like I said, cleanse again and allow the wax to dry up, and then it's complete.

Speaker 2 Carissa updates her clients to let them know that the spell has been cast. She does not offer refunds, but she says her clients keep coming back.

Speaker 2 She says she's heard criticisms of witchcraft before, and she's aware that some people call what she does a scam or even devil's work.

Speaker 19 Everyone has their own opinions, own religions, and I respect that, and I am open to all of that.

Speaker 19 But I am a witch, and this is just what I practice and I've financially blossomed and you know it's funny enough because that's not like the most important thing to me here it's what I do for my clients but it definitely has brought me to where I am now and that's what I'm very grateful of

Speaker 2 still lots of folks don't think anyone should pay for so-called magic People who see the rise of online witches as more of a trick than a treat.

Speaker 11 So I hired a witch and she was supposed to help with our immortal And spoiler alert,

Speaker 20 it didn't work. Okay.

Speaker 8 If you can order a spell through a website, there's an issue going on.

Speaker 20 Because I'm Apricadabra and not impressed.

Speaker 2 My colleague Javi, like any good reporter, is a bit of a skeptic herself.

Speaker 2 Do you believe in magic, Javi?

Speaker 4 Ooh.

Speaker 18 Um,

Speaker 6 I'm a religious person, so I don't believe in witchcraft. But you know, at the same time, like if somebody wants to put their belief in another being, like, you know, I shouldn't judge.

Speaker 2 What sticks out to you about,

Speaker 2 you know, this industry and how all of that relates to the economy?

Speaker 6 Yeah, I think my answer is a little bleak, but I feel like it points to desperation.

Speaker 6 I think it sort of indicates the moment that we're in in terms of our economy and all of the, you know, current factors that young people are facing.

Speaker 6 You know, it seems like for a lot of the sources that I talk to, they are trying all of the regular avenues and that doesn't work.

Speaker 6 So if the job market or the dating apps or the rising rents are not working in their favor, then maybe, you know, why not swing the other way and try something just completely abstract?

Speaker 2 Javi says that a lot of the people buying spells aren't the type to go into a psychic or palm reading store. But the anonymity and convenience of online shopping lowers the barrier to entry.

Speaker 2 And the magic of technology doesn't hurt either.

Speaker 6 I think the algorithms are totally responsible for fueling a lot of this.

Speaker 6 When your favorite influencer is posting on TikTok that they are hiring a witch, and then you have all these people commenting, like, hey, I tried it, or like, you know, why not?

Speaker 6 Then it sort of like fuels the fire and becomes trendy.

Speaker 2 You've covered a lot of trends in the reporting that you've done over the years.

Speaker 2 Is this trend going away?

Speaker 1 Hmm.

Speaker 6 I feel like it's not going to go away because, you know, right now it's Etsy and like in a couple of years, who knows what it will be. But like, you know, witchcraft is centuries old.

Speaker 6 It's always been here. And I feel like it will probably never disappear.

Speaker 2 That's all for today, Friday, October 31st. The journal is a co-production of Spotify and the Wall Street Journal.

Speaker 2 The show is made by Catherine Brewer, Pia Ghatkari, Rachel Humphreys, Isabella Jappal, Sophie Codner, Ryan Knutson, Matt Kwong, Colin McNulty, Annie Menoff, Laura Morris, Enrique Perez-de-La Rosa, Sarah Platt, Alan Rodriguez-Espinosa, Heather Rogers, Pierce Singey, Jiva Kaverma, Lisa Wang, Catherine Whalen, Tatiana Zemise, and me, Jessica Mendoza.

Speaker 2 Our engineers are Griffin Tanner, Nathan Singapock, and Peter Leonard. Our theme music is by So Wiley, remixed for today's episode by Peter Leonard.

Speaker 2 Additional music this week from Catherine Anderson, Peter Leonard, Billy Libby, Bobby Lord, Emma Munger, Nathan Singapock, Griffin Tanner, So Wiley, and Blue Dot Sessions.

Speaker 2 Fact-checking this week by Mary Nathis.

Speaker 2 Thanks for listening and happy Halloween. See you on Monday.