Having watched economists talking at length for the past month or more, it's hard for me to see that us armchair economists could do much worse than the experts. Most of them can't agree on what's going on anyway.
The way I see it, economics and politics are two different things. I'm carefully avoiding any specifics on political preferences on the election (other than generic poking fun at the lot of them) because I know that's a potentially divisive and emotional topic.
However, the way I see it we're facing a global economic crisis - and one which bears direct impact on us (exchange rates being one clear way). Also, I think there's a sense that the forces that are moving the economy are bigger than the ability of politicians to handle anyway (frankly, despite my own preference in the election, I have absolutely no confidence that either candidate's plan will really work, nor faith that one plan is actually better than the other).
So hearing what Andrew and other UK folk have to say about their perception of the economy is really interesting to me, as is hearing from people with different backgrounds and insights and from other places in the U.S. Who knows, maybe the knowledge will allow us to help each other?