Indians pessimistic about 2009?

This bit of news was a surprise. My take is that things have changed from the time when the survey was done in March. The same survey done now would be give quite a different result, IMHO

The hype over the recovery notwithstanding, packaged goods companies need to brace up for a tough year ahead, as a recent Boston Consulting Group study says consumers will save more and cut back on discretionary spends during the next 12 months.

The study done in March 2009 across a group of 1,800 urban consumers and 350 rural consumers with an annual income of over Rs 1 lakh stated that cuonsumers were pessimistic about the state of the economy and expected things to get worse.

Consumer spending, which had been growing at 10 per cent year-on-year, will now decrease. Over 34 per cent of the respondents said they would cut spends, while 16 per cent said would spend more in the coming year