Well they obviously do. Everytime I go to one of these places, they are absolutely mobbed and unless you call ahead, you are waiting for a table for up to an hour. The waitstaff are usually friendly but they are dreadfully overworked as these places are often understaffed (they all have HELP WANTED signs at the door).
I took five people to the restaurant last night...
Five entrees with an average cost of $13 = ($65)
Two appetizers = ($12)
Four margaritas (between three adults) at five dollars each and four softdrinks between the two kids at two dollars each = $28
Desserts (three of us declined) = $8
Total tab was about $113. Add $25 tip (service was excellent) and it was $138 total.
This is not a pricy restaurant but it adds up fast. This place was an absolute madhouse however. People were literally out the door waiting to get in. We had to park in the next parking lot over. We waited nearly an hour for our table. This scene was repeated hundreds and hundreds of times in just about every other eatery in the metro Boston area. EVERY TIME we go out to eat on a weekend night, it is a total mob scene at every place we decide to go.
I guess the point I'm trying to make here is that an enormous amount of families can afford to go out to eat often and they are spending big, big money to do so.
This is not what would be happening if our economy, as is being argued here, is going down the toilet.
What percentage of the families can afford it? During the Great Depression more than 70% of workers were employed, the people with money were getting good bargains and New York fancy restaurants had waiting lines.
The problem with america right now is the hyper-consumerism that we all take part in. A lot of the $100-spending families are using credit to pay for their restaurant bills, and they are paying interest every month to the credit card companies, since they don't actually have the money to pay the bills right off. It seems that the goal in many of our lives is to amass goods or consume, and to buy buy buy (new cars, jewelry, electronics, etc)
I don't think the fact that our restaurants are overcrowded is evidence that we enjoy a robust and healthy economy. Instead, I think it is a indicator that we can't control ourselves in today's hyper-spending hyper-consuming world. And that boils down to Americans going bankrupt, especially as interest rates keep rising, and as a result the state of America's collective checkbook showing a deeper and deeper hue of red.