Scott Kidder

As the compromises mount, people are even coming up with clever schemes to hide their cost-cutting. Holly Levitsky, a 56-year-old supermarket cashier in Cleveland, buys a brand of steak sauce called Briargate for 85 cents and surreptitiously pours it into an A1 steak sauce bottle she keeps at home. “My husband can’t even tell the difference,” she said.