Gideon Rachman: Every time I leave my house, I am on the look-out for signs of economic collapse. Empty restaurants, closing-down sales, middle-class men in casual clothes picking up their kids from school.

This may sound ghoulish. But, frankly, I think the conversations I am having these days are less disorienting than they were three weeks ago. Back then - with the financial system on the point of collapse - I had a serious discussion with my wife about whether to pull all our money out of the bank. And how exactly how would you buy krugerrands? Now, the conversations are much more mundane and centre around relatively humdrum topics such as: will we lose our jobs?