I meant "nobody is buying anything" at a "macro" level. Of course the economy continues to chug, it's just not performing at its potential (ie. cheap capital,

I meant "nobody is buying anything" at a "macro" level. Of course the economy continues to chug, it's just not performing at its potential (ie. cheap capital, cheap labour is available and no one wants to use it). Your second paragraph basically explains the debt deflationary spiral at the core of Keynes' economics. I agree that speculative investment is a problem, but we are (in Europe / the U.S. is doing relatively fine) still talking about "unreasonably low growth" given levels of unemployment - people that are idle and want to work! An economy that isn't growing has become closer to zero sum: one persons gain is another's loss. Given the historical strength of the rich at retaining and growing their relative share, this doesn't bode well for the masses. Depressions and recessions spark revolutions when they last too long.