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In Saving Freedom, Arnold Kling argues that

the need for savings has grown tremendously in the past fifty years. However, because of Social Security and Medicare, many people feel insulated from this dramatic increase in the need for savings. In reality, Social Security and Medicare are already in deficit, and the situation will worsen dramatically going forward.

We can either fund our increased post-retirement spending needs individually, out of personal savings, or collectively, out of taxes on the incomes of those who create income and wealth. In the absence of reform to Social Security and Medicare, we will choose the route of higher taxes, with potentially disastrous consequences for economic growth and personal freedom.

So far, so good. But he also links to What Would Jesus Spend? BY DEIRDRE MCCLOSKEY. She says if people lived in a more thrifty way,

Nothing would befall the market economy in the long run, says the modern economist, if we tempered our desires to a thrifty style of life--one old Volvo and a little house with a vegetable garden and a moderate amount of tofu and jug wine from the co-op. The balloon theory sounds plausible if you focus on an irrelevant mental experiment, namely, that tomorrow, suddenly, without warning, we would all begin to follow Jesus in what we buy. Such a sudden conversion would no doubt be a shock to sales of SUVs at Ford and Toyota. But, the economist observes, people in a Christian Economy would at length find other employment, or choose more leisure.

In the new, luxury-less economy it would still be a fine thing to have light bulbs and paved roads and other fruits of enterprise, and more of these would be better than less. 'In equilibrium'--a phrase with resonance in economics similar to 'by God's grace' in Abrahamic religions--the economy would encourage specialization to satisfy human desires in much the same way it does now. People would purchase Bibles in koine Greek and spirit-enhancing trips to Yosemite instead of paperback Harlequin romances and package tours to Disney World, but they would still value high-speed presses for the books and airplanes for the trips.

I manage to save more than the average American myself, but this entails not spending money. (There's a novel concept). In fact, my first reaction on seeing her reference to Nick Hornby's How to Be Good was to see if the library had it.