I put off the last big expense of having the driveway poured. The local office for my job was closed in August and a few of us were working from home. I was nervous about it. A couple weeks ago I got the call that I no longer had a job. We’ve cut what we’re spending but our debt is also going up.

All amounts previously devoted to debt service as well as our normal monthly savings are squirreled away in a high yield savings account to help us ride out the storm.

Part of me wants to resume a limited amount of consumption since such drastic cuts by many do the overall economy no good, but at this point I have to worry about my family’s well-being.

@jack: if it is college loan debt and you are going to recuperate in a good career field, then don’t worry about it. if your discretionary personal debt increased, you should be looking for ways to eliminate or reduce now before you get a job. depending on when you graduate, the job market isn’t going to be rosy for several career tracks, so don’t wish away the debt on future prospects of employment.

I imagine that’s on a $ basis and not a % one. It will always be reported in the worst possible way, since bad news sells better.

as far as net worth? well, for us it is meaningless because we don’t need to access the money we are saving. The paper value of investments has decreased, but there aren’t any realized losses for us yet. we are continuing to dump most of what we earn into investments though, and we’ve also been increasing spending (well, my wife has been) on crap (i’m at odds with the increased spending the past couple of months in lieu of saving more, although she just found out she will get another pay raise next week). we are in a good financial situation with secure jobs, so in real life terms (since we don’t have any realized losses) the economy isn’t affecting us at all and hopefully won’t. We are very fortunate in light of other people, but it wasn’t all by chance. I worked hard to pay off debt several years ago, and we have actively managed to live far below our means and to save. I see our good position now as a positive return on investing in ourselves.

I’m doing everything pretty much the same. I have no debt and don’t plan to acquire any. My investments, like everyone else’s, have taken a beating, but I haven’t stopped adding to them. I guess I’m being a little more particular in how I spend my food money, since prices have increased. But maybe they’ll go back down a bit soon.