Well, our first poll here on Cheaplander was really no surprise. The question was “How worried are you about the Eeekconomy?”

Tallying up the damage, it appears 88% of respondents to our poll are really worried, very worried or somewhat worried about the state of the economy. There were only 18 people out of 147 responding that they weren’t worried at all which is pretty much what I expected.

Still it’s very stark to see those kind of numbers. This comes on the heels of the highest new jobless claims since 2001 - over a half million folks filed for initial unemployment benefits this week. The stock market has crapped a big one since rebounding earlier, as normal folks and speculators grrr… (”speculators” make me angry) alike bet on an extended recession.

So is the sky falling for Cheaplanders everywhere? Not really, but it’s difficult to be a Cheaplander and not be a little worried. We can survive these downturns by being a little more conservative than the average saver, thinking things through before making major financial decisions and cutting back on buying new high ticket items. The thing is that you need to do these things in ADVANCE of a downturn. It’ll help to suddenly cut your spending in a recession, but wouldn’t it have been better to have paid attention to all the bling-bling paid for with credit cards when the economy was doing well?

I hate to sound like broken record, so I’ll give it a rest. I’m an ant by nature, as opposed to a grasshopper, so it comes naturally. But I have a lot of grasshopper friends who just refuse to listen, or have even (in the past) belittled my cautious ways.

Oh well.

Speaking of spending, I guess the next question is what your plans are for the coming holiday season. Are you going to be cutting down on spending? (Ooh, retailer’s hearts just skipped a few beats there.) That’ll be the next poll - please answer at right.