Day after Thanksgiving 2010

As we walked and window-shopped at Oakbrook center mall, it was interesting to see how people actually purchased items. Based on initial network news reports, this year seems to be a better year- a lot more shoppers are out and making purchases. It remains to be seen what the actual numbers are, coming from Shoppertrak (a data mining company in Chicago, which counts retail customers' traffic) or Experian.

It is a catch 22. 2/3 of the US economy is driven by consumer or domestic consumption. If the US consumer puts away their credit cards, there is a domino effect on US businesses, employment, utilities consumption, etc. However, this over consumption and overspending by the US consumer really is untenable. The unabated home equity loans to finance a new car and vacations to Mexico is no longer possible.

Will 2011 be better than 2010 for the US consumer? Is saving actually better for the US economy or is it better for the US consumer? Should there be a balance? Where is the balance?