Are things looking up?

I recently did a post about the state of the economy over on the Process Cafe Blog. In it I posited that the reaction to the current state of affairs is directly related to ones mental approach to this.

My father was speaking to me recently and he followed up by mentioning a few choice facts that might help to put people into the correct state of mind:

(In the UK, at least)

1) Mortgage rates are down which means it is costing less to make your monthly house repayments
2) Oil is down from $140 a barrel to under $50 which means fuel is cheaper. Your car costs less to run and your house should cost less to heat
3) Food prices have dropped recently which means your grocery bill is lower
4) Shops are putting on sales to encourage customers to buy so it is now cheaper to purchase things
5) Inflation is at it's lowest level for many years so prices are not rising
5) Salaries are generally no less than they were last year

Add all these things together and it appears that we have the same money in our pockets as we did last year but our overall outgoings have dropped.

Shouldn't this be something we can celebrate and look positively at?