>>>Generally, when people are socking money away their savings account, or reducing their spending in some way, it means they're trying to expose themselves to less risk because they're worried about the future.
No. That is totally against the American tradition of consumer banking (at least until 1970s stagflation) as well as the way banking has been practiced in Japan. "Save it for a rainy day" didn't come from nowhere. It's what most Americans used to practice. And in Japan they are exhorted to bank as a national good to fund loans to companies. A lack of confidence in the future -- incomes remaining the same -- would empty banks of deposits.
No. You're completely wrong and I'm starting to conclude that you're taking what's right, inverting it, and writing it as a comment.
The consumer confidence index is a measure of savings and spending. The more confident consumers are, the more people are spending and the less they're saving, and vice versa. This isn't an American thing.
What people have been taught and what people actually do are two different things.
No. That is totally against the American tradition of consumer banking (at least until 1970s stagflation) as well as the way banking has been practiced in Japan. "Save it for a rainy day" didn't come from nowhere. It's what most Americans used to practice. And in Japan they are exhorted to bank as a national good to fund loans to companies. A lack of confidence in the future -- incomes remaining the same -- would empty banks of deposits.