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While going out to brunch this last weekend, I noticed something. I could sit down.

That doesn’t seem like much, but we go to a pretty popular restaurant for our Sunday brunches. It’s a semi-middle class buffet with really good food. The odd thing is that it’s usually packed to the gills during Sunday. There’s the early risers, that come in for breakfast, the crowd we come in with that ‘time it’ to get a little breakfast and lunch (come in just before shift-over) and the churchgoers that come in after church. Between all of these groups, the place is usually pretty jumping.

Where are All the Hungry Masses?

Not so this last weekend. The place was fairly deserted. There wasn’t any activities going on in town like fairs or carnivals that I knew of, and still the place was almost empty.

Then I started thinking back a little bit and realized that there were a number of places I had been noticing lately with less crowds. For the Fourth of July, the crowds that had come out to see the fireworks were less than half what they used to be. Additionally, most of the first-run movies I had been to in the last few months hadn’t been NEARLY as packed as they used to be (Except for Wall-E, which BTW was Great!). I don’t know if this has to do with the quality of the movies or not, as a lot of them were pretty good.

Have YOU Seen My Customers?

I started talking about it with some co-workers, and they mentioned that they too had noticed a decided drop in attendance at a lot of different stores and events. The local permanent amusement park, Worlds of Fun (think Six Flags) has had a couple of years of low attendance, and this year in particular looks to be turning out to be particularly deserted.

Baseball games seem to attract a lot less people nowadays, as I can see how many seats are filled from the highway as I drive past (ether because of the economy, or because the home team just sucks this year, take your pick).

Even a lot of shopping malls and big box stores seem to have a lot less customers roaming around them nowadays.

Think it’s the Economy?

It seems (to me anyway) that a number of factors are making the middle class masses stay at home much more nowadays.

• High Gas Prices - Make traveling and going out more expensive
• Higher Food Prices - Increasing restaurant costs
• Job Losses - People that get laid off or are worried about being laid off usually save as much as possible in anticipation.
• Bad Economy - Hearing almost incessantly about how bad things are, also triggers the saving gland.
• Never-Ending War - Our economy having a huge amount of money siphoned off to fund the war in Iraq (not political, just a fact).
• Uncertain Presidency - it seems to be shaping up to a very interesting race. One which if one side wins, will probably greatly benefit the middle class, and if the other side should win, will benefit big business and the upper income earners. A true class contest in the making.
• Credit Crunch - Credit card companies are pulling back the ‘easy credit’ and it’s starting to affect consumers via higher interest rates and credit refusals. No easy money means less spending on non-essentials

All of these add up to an environment that scares the bejeezus out of a lot of families that have been just barely making it.

Perception is Reality

Even with the stimulus checks, which did have a minor effect this last month (largest percentage increase of spending in decades), it doesn’t provide long-term confidence in our economy. Add to that the torrent of news showing that ‘things are bad’ and it starts to become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Things are rocky, I’ll admit, but the U.S. economy has already weathered things that would have devastated some lesser countries. We’ve been hit by a recession (don’t mince words, that’s what it is) the housing bubble, high gas prices, and skyrocketing prices in consumer goods. This is also the first time in years that the Fed has seriously had to worry about inflation.

But even with all that, we’re only in a minor slowdown. That might last quite awhile, but it’s not the Great Depression all over again. Even though things sound bad, they could be much worse. We’re actually doing pretty good, all things considered;

- The Housing Bubble is slowly correcting itself . People are still losing their houses, but many have already realized that they overextended themselves and have been preparing for eventualities as much as possible. It’s not such a surprise when they can’t pay for the increase in the ARM.

- The Unemployment rate is still somewhat high (hitting 5.5% last month) but still not nearly as bad as it was during the last Dot Com bubble burst. People are having harder times finding jobs, but the government is working to extend unemployment an additional 13-26 weeks as an aid.

- People are working on finding different ways to save money on gas prices. Companies and even government agencies are encouraging people to telecommute more and/or work compressed schedules. The stigma of working from home is overshadowed by the threat of losing a good employee because commuting costs force them to re-assess their jobs. Additionally, as a side note, this is also causing some re-vitalization of some urban areas, as people move closer to their jobs. Some areas are actually experiencing homes sales increases because of this.

So maybe things only look bad for the moment. It could be a lot worse than it is.

Do you think things are getting better or getting worse? Leave us a comment and let us know!

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