Burt Flickinger, managing director of retail consultantcy Strategic Resource Group, said the US has just entered a 500-day retail recession, and before it’s over, the US will see weaker retail sales, more store closures and even additional retailers joining Borders in bankruptcy.

Helping to drive the trend is a weak labor market, Flickinger said.

Job growth has remained elusive, pushing the unemployment rate to 9.2 percent. Flickinger also expects more people will be joining the ranks of the unemployed as state and local governments make further cuts to their budgets.

The latest consumer confidence reportfrom the Conference Board showed consumer attitudes perked up from the prior month, but it also captured growing fears about jobs. Those fears are likely to curtail spending, especially when you consider the large numbers of households that are living paycheck to paycheck.

Flickinger also cited the long-term unemployed who will stop receiving extended unemployment benefitsthis year as another contributing factor. Once the checks stop arriving, these people will have even less money than they do now.

A recent study by Moody's Analytics estimated that close to $2 of every $10 that went into American's wallets last year were payments like jobless benefits, food stamps, Social Security and disability. As the jobless benefits expire, about $37 billion will be drained from the nation's pocketbooks, according to Moody's.

Couple these trends with sky-rocketing inflation for food and clothingas well as for gasoline prices, which are on the rise again, and you quickly see just how pinched the consumer is.