Clearly, the role of all the stories is to keep your attention acutely focused upon yourself. The worse things get, you must not engage in rage, remonstration, or “stoicism,” much less communal support; instead, the space spanned by your consciousness becomes the perimeter of the “economy,” which is no longer about what you may make, but consists exclusively of the stories you tell about yourself. Your vigilance must never waver from its focus upon the center of your own little universe. If you encounter some difficulty in comfortably inhabiting your own little cubbyhole, there is always someone else who will tell you how to succeed at it, for a modest fee. Conjure the confidence fairy! The contemporary financial crisis collapses to a temporary aberration between your ears. Let them buy cake! If only you, the consumer, would rouse yourself to spend more!

Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis …, loc. 433