For the economy to grow more this year than last year, on average the ‘pieces’ need to grow at higher rates, which isn’t happening as previously discussed.

And underneath it all, for every agent that spends less than his income (demand leakages) another has to spend more than his income, or the output doesn’t get sold.

For all practical purposes, ‘spending more than income’ comes down to ‘borrowing to spend’ rather than depleting ‘savings accounts’ to spend.

And with the largest agent that spends more than its income- government deficit spending- on the decline, we need ‘borrowing to spend’ to increase that much more to sustain positive GDP growth.

Unfortunately the growth rate of credit expansion looks to be going the wrong way.

Bank lending: