Toya Howard

55
Travel agent
Chicago

How has the financial and economic turmoil affected you and your family?

My family hasn't been affected. I noticed that prices are up but it hasn't stopped me from anything I was normally doing.

How long do you think it'll take before the economy recovers?

I have a house for sale, so I think that [it] has an impact on how fast the house is sold. It just seems that activity is not as fast as it could be. Other people are cutting their prices, so it's suppressing the prices that we could sell the house for.

If the economy and the markets don't improve until 2009, how will this affect you and your family?

It's tough to say because this current Administration has put us in the toilet in many ways. I'm hoping Obama wins and…helps raise our markets. But the hole is so deep that it can easily take to 2010 or 2011 to get things where they were with Clinton—if we ever get there again.

What should be done to make things better?

People need to stop being so wasteful. We're very wasteful in our packaging, we're very wasteful in our consumerism, in our energy use. We need more thoughtful consumerism. More personal responsibility with respect to health. I do think there should be some curbs on the excessive lending practices that led to where we are now. I never believed in "no money down for a house." That's insanity—and I am a former loan officer.

And, last, how have recent economic and financial worries changed your Starbucks habit?

[She says the crisis hasn't changed her habit.]

—Manuel Baigorri