A normally busy restaurant near me was half empty on Saturday evening. The same was true of a usually vibrant bar around the corner. What’s going on? The answer is unfortunately simple – household budgets are now tight for most of us.

For the past few weeks there’s been a lot of talk about the senate and house drafting a plan to bail out mortgage holders. The plan is to let judges change the terms of the mortgages. That means changing the amount owed and setting lower rates. Can you believe that?