Raha: Consumers will hunker down, stop spending. That’s not good.

Raha said he expects the difference between consumer earning and spending to widen this year. “Consumers will hunker down,” he said, and stop spending because they fear for what will come.

Forecast by fiscal year: 8.3 percent decline in 2009, 3.6 percent growth in 2010, and 8.1 percent growth in 2011. That means we won’t get back to levels seen before the recession until 2011.

“Everything we feared could go wrong did,” he said. But, he said, “Sometimes we get unexpected good surprises. Did I mention that Ken Griffey Jr. might come back.”