If at some stage, the money goes into improving productive capacity, then it is not too bad. The consumers themselves may not be increasing productive capacity

If at some stage, the money goes into improving productive capacity, then it is not too bad. The consumers themselves may not be increasing productive capacity, and in my opinion are generally not, but the companies their money goes to often are. US purchasing power parity GDP per capita is in the top ten in world. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28PPP%29_per_capita http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_%28PPP... This seems to me as good a measure of productive capacity as any. The consumers of the US may be borrowing heavily, but the previously borrowed money mustn't all have been pissed down the drain.