The economy, prices and spirits are down. From bank runs to mobs in Thailand and Greece to end-of-the-world sales, it’s a restless world, one in need of a catharsis.

Or, maybe, just a joke or two.“Happiness or sadness, regret or anticipation, triumph or embarrassment, warmth or wickedness, the important thing - and apparently sometimes the hardest thing nowadays - is to keep on smiling,” wrote Seth Mydans in The Times.

That smile is apparently so hard to come by in Thailand these days that the motorcycle policemen have resorted to wearing white anti-pollution masks painted with a red grin“to lift the mood of motorists,”wrote Mr.Mydans.

Singapore once promoted a Four Million Smiles campaign to get people to put on happier faces. And in Japan, where the seriousness of life can be overwhelming, workers have been trained to hold a chopstick in their teeth to produce a smiling face, wrote Mr.Mydans. Now Thailand, which calls itself the Land of Smiles, is trying to live up to its claim.

“These past few years that smile has worn thin because we are all angry at each other and willing to show it,”Ammar Siamwalla, an economist in Bangkok, told Mr.Mydans.

Some people are finding ways to smile about what is otherwise a painful situation. Financial jokes are flourishing, making their way through comedians, satirical Web sites, YouTube and even eBay, where Iceland, the entire country that went bankrupt this fall, was up for auction for 50 cents.

Also up for bidding are items related to Bernard L.Madoff, the New York financial wizard accused of swindling investors out of as much as $50 billion in a pyramid financial scheme. T-shirts and beach towels with Mr.Madoff’s name are being sold to the highest bidder.

“It’s sad, but it’s still humorous,”said John Mitchell of Illinois, who sold a cigar humidor bearing Mr.Madoff’s name, according to The Associated Press.

Stocks may be down, but schadenfreude is up. Victims of scathing satire are on Web sites like LolFed.com, where photos appear with humorous captions scrawled on the faces of bankers and others like John A.Thain of Merrill Lynch, Vikram S.Pandit of Citigroup and Ben S.Bernanke, the United States Federal Reserve chairman.

“Laughing at well-known people and bad situations can be a good way to channel anxiety and release tension,”Shawn Achor, a business consultant who teaches psychology courses at Harvard University, told The Times’s Liz Alderman.

In a few cases, people who have lost their jobs have not lost their senses of humor. Hannah Seligson of The Times found bankers and lawyers exploring comedy, filmmaking and writing.

Greg Collett, 37, left his job as a director in commodity funds at Deutsche Bank last summer to try stand-up comedy, wrote Ms.Seligson.

Shaun Gatter, 38, said he left his job as a vice president and counsel at a large investment bank to work on his novel.“I think that people who are losing their jobs are being forced to pursue their dreams and, in a way, are being liberated from the golden handcuffs of Wall Street and venturing into something that might fulfill them.”

For those who find their fulfillment in yoga, now it can also make them laugh. Some instructors are transforming what can be a solemn and intense practice into classes with levity - telling jokes, using props and chanting to pop lyrics, wrote The Times’s Abby Ellin.

“When you laugh, you open your heart to reality,”said Sadie Nardini, a yoga director in Manhattan, who chants to tunes by Bon Jovi.“Truth is there, deep in that laughing place.”

And that just may be the place the world needs now. As Karen B.Cohen, 46, a master yoga instructor in Virginia, said: “Laughing is healthy. Joy is healthy. A bit of goofy is good.”