AfF,
Don’t be so quick to shortsell your observations as idle speculation. What you are reporting on is anecdotal evidence of the next wave of the meltdown, which we are actually a couple of months into. As I said yesterday, the elephant in the corner that the mainstream media is either intentionally ignoring or doesn’t understand the significance of is the shutdown of the retail economy. Take a look at the monthly same store sales reports of the major drivers of the US retail economy – Walmart, Target, Home Depot, Lowe’s, GM, Ford, Chrysler, Best Buy. Just in the past few weeks retailers themselves have been pulling the plug on new store development projects because they sense they can no longer ignore the slowed pace of spending. Sales have been slowing down at a not insignificant pace since last year. Retail spending has stopped because the home equity spigot has been completely tapped in the bubble markets of the country. Elsewhere, spending is down because the middle class just doesn’t have the money to buy things. People who can buy houses aren’t because they are scared of where values are going. On the other hand, people who would buy HDTVs, boats, new cars, and vacations aren’t because they can’t. The home equity that fueled those purchases since 2000 has evaporated. And when this great consumer economy that has driven things for so long totally hits the skids, that’s the time ‘look out below’ mentality takes hold.
