As soon as gas prices started going up, people started doing what you said. Stopped buying stuff.
That was a huge contributor to the economy crashing harder than it would’ve otherwise. There’s no easy answers here except for a few like stop H1B’s, kick out illegals (and especially enforce hiring laws on them), and help the offshoring issue with tariffs and/or diplmacy to turn ‘free trade’ into more ‘fair trade’.
I don’t know, it seems everytime I’ve driven by Restaurant Row the past few years, the parking lots are always full.