Subject: Re: Americans Say The Economy Getting Worse
1. Do they have the CASH resources to support their spending?

2. If they do NOT have the cash, then their spending will be curtailed when then run out of credit cards AND things to sell to fund their overspending.

And #3:
If they feel the economy is bad, they are more likely to hunker-down. Delay purchases, become tight with spending. Which is sort of a self-fulfilling prophecy, because if nobody is spending money, the economy will get worse than it already is, becoming as bad as they thought it was (which reinforces their decision to go into thrift mode).