My condolences to all of the fine people WOTC laid off. You all have done incredible work over the years and we hope to hear soon what your new plans are. This is a terrible time both of the year and during the economic crisis and our blessings are with you and your families.
As for the economy, the worse thing people can do right now is stop spending money. Typically, when recessions occur it causes a panic and people stop spending. Then the recession worsens, and its a downward spiral from there. Which means more spending cuts and company layoffs.
The main issue right now is the housing market, which is then hitting the credit and banking systems, which in turn is hurting Wall Street. The housing and banking is the first thing the new administration is correcting. If you are still employed and your monthly expenses are uneffected so far, then go about business as usual or you will make the ship sink even faster and cause more company cuts and layoffs before the government can bail us all out.
This effects everyone across the world too, as Amercia's economy direct influences the world economy. Which, to the rest of the world, as our dollar's exchange value drops from the bail out injection, you can get good deals from our exports, which gives us a flush of revenue and then helps everything get running again, which eventually helps your country too.
Anyrate, terrible news. Hopefully all will turn out well for those fine folk. In the meantime, support your local and global businesses as you have to avoid this sort of terrible things from happening again.
Peace.