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Hey Andy - I am weathering the storm OK for now. Since I decided long ago that going through life not saving any money and living off credit card debt was not for me, I am not on my way out into the street. A lot of people who are in trouble now have their own bad decisions to thank - not people who have lost jobs, but people who have been living off of credit cards and generally way above their means. It had to implode sooner or later, and the only shock for me is that it took so long. We have a negative savings rate in this country of -1%. People are not saving anywhere close to what they should be for retirement, they bought houses they couldn't afford and they've been buying expensive things they don't need. We needed effective leadership to point these problems out and to make some tough decisions, but neither party was willing to end all the fun to point out the major financial problems that have existed for years. The excessive debt (both personal and from irresponsible government spending) was going to catch up with us eventually. Unfortunately all of this is taking the responsible folks down, too.

I am lucky to still have a job considering what's happening with the financial industry. I should be fine since my company is on solid ground, even though the stock has been tanking only due to the industry we're in. People are tossing rational thinking and are painting everything with a wide brush in this type of a panic driven market. I wasn't in the market for most of this year (kind of saw the handwriting on the wall early on) so my retirement savings are still mostly there - I did get back in since I didn't want to miss the eventual upswing (going to come back sooner or later!) so I missed out on the first 35% decline in the markets but not the second 10%. Since I'm 33 I have to take more chances with this stuff.. although I wish I had waited a few more weeks to get back in. If I were 30 years older I'd be in 100% fixed everything. Like you I've also cut back on my spending - not that I was spending all that much to begin with. So I am hanging on.. hoping things don't get much worse but realizing any quick turnaround does not appear to be in the cards for a while.