1. Subscribe to a news source. If you scan your social media feed and get frustrated at the articles you can’t read without a subscription… or happy at the ones that are “free,” consider subscribing. They keep asking you to. Now is perhaps the time to spend that $1 or $25 a year the pop-up windows are begging you to give.

2. Buy an e-book. Or 2 or 3. Amazon will probably weather the economic slowdown fine, so consider buying from a local bookstore or smaller online retailer like Barnes and Noble or Smashwords or Author House. Keep the small guys in business and have more of your purchase price go to the authors themselves. Shameless promotion: Here are ways to buy my books: Syncopation and The Stolen Goldin Violin.

3. Pay for some music. I’m not a person who listens to a lot of music, but if you do, you probably know how to get it online. Order a song; subscribe to a service. Again, investigate ways for the musicians to get the bulk of your money.

4. As much as I “hate” the cable companies, I’m finding their product one of the most important things in my life right now. Maybe up your subscription? Stream more movies?

5. What else can you buy online that doesn’t involve endangering people? I worry for the people packing up boxes in close proximity to each other, and the drivers getting close together to load and unload trucks, and the cooks side-by-side in a kitchen, and the grocery store employees. I want people to work, but I fear for the health of those who keep working.

I’m a writer, not an economist, and just trying to be helpful. These are a few of my ideas. Do you have some? The comments are open. Please respond with more ideas, but let’s be nice, OK?