Financial Tsunami Helps Americans Rediscover Virtues Of Frugality And Thrift (WMT)

A generation of Americans who, prior to the Great Recession, had never seen so severe an economic downturn, are learning some old fashioned American values the hard way.

Materialism and mindless consumption for the sake of consumption are on their way out. Thrift and recession are back in fashion. This is in line with the general trend of Americans saving more during tough times.

What makes it different this time though is that some of these values could remain etched for a lifetime. This could spell good news for companies like WalMart (NYSE: WMT) who through their concept of everyday low pricing could draw more customers who would earlier have chosen higher end competitors.