Money-Saving Hints

Americans should take the economic meltdown as a cue to start changing their ways, Dylan says. "This is the biggest wake-up call for America since the country came to be, or at the very least since the Great Depression," he says. "The fact that we were willing to pay $40 a month to borrow $1,000 on our credit card...if it looks to good to be true, it is too good to be true."

Dylan says the crisis will pass, but people need to fix their spending habits in the meantime. That may be hard for generations of people who have gotten used to buying things with credit, but Dylan says it's necessary. "We have a couple of choices here," he says. "We get thrifty and become more intelligent ... or we deal with dire consequences as a result of not getting responsible for our money once and for all."