In the latest issue of the combined Bloomberg/Businessweek (how’s that going, anyway?) you’ll find this intriguing story about the changing habits of the American consumer.

In March, Ralph Ronzio went to a warehouse in a seedy part of Orange County, California, and watched a man auction off his condo for half what he’d paid for it. Ronzio had bought the place for $329,000 in 2005, when he moved to Southern California from Rhode Island to take a job at a data-storage company. It was the first place he’d ever owned.

“It was totally my bachelor pad,” he says. “Not much inside other than the usual leather couch and the big screen TV. My fiancée made me sell the couch.”

That wasn’t the only thing that changed when Ronzio got engaged. His fiancée had two young children, and there wasn’t enough room in the condo for all four of them. So last year, Ronzio bought a house nine miles (14 kilometers) away and they all moved in. He figured he could rent the condo and cover his costs. He figured wrong, Bloomberg Businessweek reports in its Aug. 2 issue.

The more he thought about the money he was losing, the more it stressed him out. Finally, Ronzio enlisted the help of a firm called You Walk Away and did exactly that from the remaining $319,000 on his condo mortgage. When the bank foreclosed, he says he felt a sense of relief. He also had more cash. He and his fiancée took the kids to Disneyland. Ronzio, 31, gave himself a treat as well.

“I bought myself an iPad,” he says.

They once used to say, “what’s more important than the five percent unemployed not spending money is how the other 95 percent do spend theirs”. Apparently, only the numbers have changed as you”ll read about accountant Lucy Johnston not having as many “full-on spa days” anymore while staying at the Bellagio in Las Vegas and how people are buying store brand toothpaste but still getting their daily $4 Starbucks fix.

We’re not making much progress in moving away from a consumption-based economy.