But sense diminishes as cash flow or confidence in credit rises - or so it would appear from the retailers' and banks' gleeful reports of shoppers carrying all before them. Sooner or later, the authorities will decide that the fun has to be paid for. Mortgages will become more expensive. Either way, they have to go without at some point. The individual's free will in an economic context is at best irrelevant.
Globalisation means that for many workers, bosses are thousands of miles away.
Electricity and water services line the pockets of American firms. Talk of electronic money baffles many. In the UK, the increasing number of jobless households means the concept of a bank account and cheque book, let alone a credit card, is an alien one. To top it all, there is Europe and the single currency which a large chunk of the public dismisses as too complicated to think about. Fear of losing control to Euro-bankers or to American companies is pointless.