Some things are just too important to give up, even during bad economic times. American consumers, according to a survey conducted by BIGresearch for STORES magazine, those things include:

Internet, which 80.9% of survey participants aren’t willing to sacrifice,
Cell phones 64.1%

Among other necessities:
Cable TV 60.5%
Discount clothes shopping 43%
Haircuts and coloring 40%

However, shoppers are willing to scale back on such items as:
Luxury handbags 92.2%
Satellite radio 90.9%
Maid service 90%

Check out BIGresearch. You can also find these folks on twitter at Twitter/bigresearch they share great consumer info.

Also see STORES magazine Why should you be interested in looking at this site? Because it is about stores, merchandising and consumer shopping.