[jcommin]

People are hurting. $4.00/gallon gasoline did that. Everything snowballed after that. Go to a restaurant and see busy they are. Add that to the housing bubble, foreclosures, tight credit and you got what you got.

I have said this on other boards, the consumer has spent our way out of the last downturns and they did it on credit. When you have less discretionary spending, you won't spend and we can't grow - certainly not as fast. What you may see is a shift in the way we live - not spend as much (because we can't) and a move away from consumption to saving. That's going to cause a ripple of our service economy. Personally I can't wait to see this. I have worked in manufacturing for over 35 years and I have seen a erosion of jobs and factories leave this country. We need to develop an energy source to remove our dependency on foreigh oil. We could create a new segment - energy .

To grow as a country; you got to have something everyone wants - goods, services and the like. We got to stop worrying about the 'numbers' for the quarter and focus on the long term. This may be painful for some; we are so use to quick fixes.