Port-Au-Prince, Haiti -- The U.S. economic crisis touched down recently in the dusty town where Marie Rosita Simon ekes out a living selling sandals. Her brother, a New Jersey cabdriver, slashed his monthly $400 transfer to her by half because his business was off.

For Simon, that amounted to a 40 percent plunge in income for her family of five. Coming after a horrendous year in which food prices soared and hurricanes washed away her plantain and bean crops, the 43-year-old street vendor decided something had to go: dinner. And sometimes she can't provide breakfast for her children.

'They're hungry,' she confessed.