four people at different times of the same day with pieces of farewell cake in The New York Times elevators.

I know we are in an economic downturn when the professional dog walkers start disappearing from 5th Avenue.

NYC

A Big economic indicator in New York is the cost of a slice of pizza- a cheap food that lots of people rely on for sustenance. As the cost of pizza pushes $3 and $4, there's a lot of people that have a hard time feeding themselves.

Hi my name is Troy. I'm from Grand Forks North Dakota and my favorite economic indicator by far is the recent stock and profit troubles of the coffee juggernaut Starbucks.

I've been listening to your show this week and enjoying it as it seems to be geared toward a more youthful and hip audience. However, there is an aspect of youthful, hip culture that is very flip and ironic- which is fine- if it is also delving into issues and revealing more subtle truths. (The Daily Show is an example of this.) Today, when you were talking about the candidates personal narratives I was surprised the tone of the conversation never went much beyond "What's up with personal narrative? Does anyone care?" For Americans, the President's background is paramount. Bush's 'regler guy' narrative got him elected! Obama grew up in the most populated Muslim country in the world. His argument is that this is going to have an effect on our relations with Muslim countries. He has relatives living in rural Kenya. This will have a unique effect on our relations with Africa. So, yes, millions of people around the world care. I like The Take Away's efforts but I would love to hear a more nuanced conversation about your topics. Us flip hipsters can not only handle it, we're starving for it. -Northampton, MA

Hey, it's Joe from Manhattan and my economic is been here. It's been like walking the street in Manhattan in the morning and see longer lines at the coffee truck.

...George Bush announcing tough times (think of what happened after he announced 'mission accomplished').

I have a LEADING indicator! Drive the streets of your area - and as you do, survey the vacancy rate of retail establishments and Industrial parks.

Thus, as indicators, Industrial vacancy leads, retail lags.

Industrial park vacancies indicate employment stress and leads future disposable income. Retail vacancy is the symptom of disposable income stress.

This has been working for me for over 15 years.

I'm not in real estate, but it shows local conditions quite well. The new element this time is a tide foreclosures.

My current (amateur) impression in New Jersey is slow industrial improvement (Vacancies are quite high locally, but no longer deteriorating). The Retail economy will likely be deteriorating for perhaps a year.

My name is Amy from Oklahoma

You know things are getting bad, when you actually see people in the parking lots and stores, bending over to pick up change that they dropped. In better times it is usually to much of an effort(to some) to bend over for those couple of pennies/nickles/dimes and sometimes even quarters that they dropped.I have even heard people say(in the past) "Well really what can you get for a dime these days." But now I have seen people chasing down pennies that tried to roll away...

You know you're in an economic downturn when people begin to make significant behavioral changes in their lifestyle (jobs, dinners out, driving distances, etc). It's scary but there's a certain positivity that comes with living deliberately and thinking about what in life truly matters to us. I live in the Boston burbs and it's not necessarily convenient to public transportation. But over the past few weeks, I've made an effort to use it about 90% of the time. I've noticed the parking lot at work is less full so I know I'm not alone in this. It's a mindset change.