Consumer confidence has been sliced in half over the past year and last week's hail of bad economic news is expected to make people even more skittish about their spending.

That means some people who sell big-ticket items such as real estate, cars and furniture -- jobs that traditionally pay large commissions but negligible salaries -- are suffering more than people whose paychecks are less tied to consumers' whims.

"There are a lot of people that are being challenged right now," said Loren Keim , president of Century 21 Keim Realtors in Allentown.

Keim said that with the housing market down, so is his income -- about 20 percent compared with this time last year. Still, he considers himself one of the lucky ones. He estimates hundreds of his local peers could be driven from the business. If houses don't sell, they can't make the commissions needed to support themselves and their families.

Real estate agents are hardly the only ones struggling.

Automobile dealers also have watched sales drop and many across the country have been forced out of business.

Paul Taylor, chief economist for the National Automobile Dealers Association, said sales are off by more than two million vehicles -- more than 12 percent -- this year.

"The impact has been dramatic," Taylor said. "We expect about 500 to 600 dealerships to be lost from the industry this year. For sales people who work on commission as a large part of their salary, the slow sales are unfortunate, but it means they are more likely to keep their jobs should they try to wait the sales slump out."

Jim Barndt, general sales manager at Kelly Ford in Emmaus, said the sales staff there has been working harder to close deals.

"It's been a little bit of a struggle," he said.

A salesmen at an Allentown mattress store said his take-home pay is down about 30 percent so far this year as customers shy away from luxury purchases such as bigger, better bedding.

"Everybody I know [on the sales staff], their paychecks have gone down," said the man, who asked that his name be withheld because he feared losing his job.

He and his wife have cut back on eating out and are driving less to save on gas, he said. He worries about paying off his children's college expenses.

But the news is not all bad for those who rely on commissions to pay their bills.

When times are tough in real estate, Keim said, branching out is key -- for instance, dealing in business-related real estate rather than just homes.

"We have a much broader, more diverse market in our company now," he said.

darryl.isherwood@mcall.com

610-820-6533

brian.callaway@mcall.com

610-820-6168

The Associated Press contributed to this report.