So what did this deeply depressed consumer do? She went out spent like there was no tomorrow.

Continued job and real wage growth is needed to increase a household's pool of cash and to strengthen discount retailers' sales, ... An improved labor market would make consumer spending more self-reinforcing and less dependent on tax and interest rate-related stimulus.

It has literally turned your house into an A.T.M. in the last couple of years. That will virtually go away.

At the end of a long economic expansion, consumers tend to be overconfident relative to their spending; raising false hopes about the ability of consumers to continue spending. At the beginning of a recovery, consumers remain in a funk even as they accelerate their pace of spending.

The Japanese economy for the first time in 15 years is getting up off the mat. They've gotten their banking system back in shape. Europe will probably muddle along, but China's growth will still be quite strong.

The process is slow in happening. The level at which the consumer starts making changes is pretty inelastic, In other words, it takes a high threshold of pain before they start making changes.