In this interview by Charlie Rose
http://calculatedrisk.blogspot.com/2008/09/charlie-rose-fannie-and-freddie.html
Charlie Rose asks Roubini what should we be talking about and what should we be doing. One of the things that Roubini talked about was 'jingle mail' and he said that at some point 40% of all people with a mortgage will be under water.

One thing that is getting missed is that people who are stable stay in their homes even when they are underwater. They aren't 'walking away' because they think it's fun. The reason that the number is so scary is because those people have very limited options WHEN THINGS GO WRONG.

If there is a job loss, health crisis, divorce, selling the house as a way to ease the strains is no longer an option, and at that point they walk away.

What should we be doing? Reducing the strains on american workers. How?

Universal health care. We are putting billions upon trillions propping up financial entities. We could be taking a HUGE monkey off of everyone's back in this one move.
Tuition relief. Make a peace corp program or something, but get the stress of college costs off of our backs.
Credit relief. Put an instant max of 12 or 13% on credit cards. Let the chips fall.

do these things and put the american worker on more solid footing and he/she will spend again.