Payday lending customers in Alabama are belt tightening.  From the story:

Several chains of stores operating in the Montgom­ery area say the annual spike in the final five or six weeks of the year didn’t hap­pen this year, reflecting a the results found in a survey conducted by Borrow Smart Alabama, an industry trade association.

The survey shows that more payday owners are re­porting a decline in business this year, with about three times as many reporting a decline in December as re­ported an increase in lend­ing.

But we’re told over and over again by the media that payday lenders benefit from the economic downturn.  It was shrewd of Borrow Smart Alabama to do a survey disproving this.