We’re an enormously resilient species and from everything I see and hear around me—from reading the tape and paying attention to behaviors and actions and conversations—I don’t see the sky falling. Instead, I see people going out to eat, shopping, traveling, working, and generally getting on with life.

And as I write this post, despite what seems to be bad news on the economic front, the Wall Street Journal reports that consumers are spending – the August report shows overall retail gains of .3%, which WSJ calls “resilience in the face of inflation.”