That is very interesting! I just realized that when I went to my hair appointment on Monday, my usually crowded salon was mostly empty.
But... I think Monday is a slow salon day altogether, because it is located at a popular mall, and open on weekends. The stylist I currently use, and my previous one, always worked weekends, and were off on Mondays. I think it was just a slow day.
The lull may also be because Thanksgiving is early this year. Pretty much everyone I know (including me), woke up on Monday, and thought, for the first time this year, "Holy cow, that's next week!" I've cancelled stuff this week to try and get things in order, before the four-day "Gateway to Holiday Madness" opens next week.
All that being said... I believe your stylist. I think that despite all of our technology and our removal from our earlier, more primitive selves, we still exhibit collective, instinctive behaviors, in just the same way that the geese migrated earlier through Florida last year, or the same way that the leaves on the trees outside my condo are dumping their leaves several weeks later than past years. Perhaps this is Malcolm Gladwell's Blink, applied on a larger-scale. And I expect that as Election Day draws closer, we will see shifts in the U.S. economy for sure.
I actually decided last week to scale back a little on the mani-pedis, and stretch those out a little farther, so I can holiday shop with a clear mind. Now I'm wondering. My feeling the past six months has been to downsize, and sell off things I don't need, and to be more frugal.