WASHINGTON — In January, after putting the kids to bed, Mary Morrill and her husband spread their monthly bills, grocery receipts and checkbooks on the kitchen table and began the first of several long nights finding ways to cut spending -- especially with credit cards.
They would pack their own lunches, write dinner menus to curb impulse buying at the grocery store, even cut out trips to McDonald's, which had been a treat for the kids and a convenience for the Morrills. And it all worked.
"We literally have not charged anything for almost a year," said Morrill, 39, who lives with her husband and two children outside Cedar Rapids, Iowa. "If anything, we really feel like the bad economy was a wake-up call for us. In the long run it's going to help us. It's a reality check."
The Morrills' ability to make and stick to their first family budget in nine years of marriage, as well as their success in paring down what had been more than $10,000 in credit card debt, may seem entirely admirable.
But as good as it may be for the Morrills themselves, their decision to batten down the hatches and stick to their newfound frugality month after month adds to a growing body of evidence that casts a potentially dark shadow over the economic future of the nation as a whole.
After the most punishing downturn in half a century, the U.S. economy has finally begun showing signs of renewed life. Stock prices and factory orders are up. The housing market appears to be stabilizing. Job losses are moderating. Overall, the economy has begun to grow, officials believe.
Welcome as all those developments are, many analysts worry that they may not be enough to offset another trend: the continuing refusal -- or in many cases the inability -- of millions of U.S. consumers to go out and spend money the way they did before the crash.
Because consumer spending accounts for a whopping 70% of all economic activity, a resurgence of spending by people like the Morrills is considered indispensable for a robust and sustained recovery.
In times past, when things got better, people went back to spending. This time, maybe not.
When American Express asked a sampling of 2,032 people late last month what they would do if they found $500, the answers were like a pitcher of ice water in the face of retailers. Survey respondents were offered a list of possible spending choices that included splurging at a restaurant, going on a shopping spree and taking a trip.
