Bit of a long shot here coberst! I would, in my very wildest of dreams have never thought that dieting shared a causal relationship with the GFC! I'm still not sure it does, but I must congraulate you on such an original premise!

The sad fact is that there probably only two ways to lose weight- one is to stop eating so much and the other is to stop the food reaching the stomach, as in vomiting intentionally after meals or having surgery to stop the food passing into the stomach. Neither are fun, but they apparently work. So maybe the analogy succeeds, as the remedy for the current financial mess is going to require sacrifice and pain to an uncomfortable degree as we go on a financial 'diet'.