The key component of any recession is that the vast majority of the public simultaneously decide to stop spending money and instead focus on paying off debts. In the United States, this trend has been in effect primarily since October 2008, but was occurring at a slower pace since late 2006.
In the previous three and a half years, the amount of consumer credit card debt in the United States has decreased by some 30%. As a result, there is a growing number of individuals within the American consumer base that is becoming increasingly freer to spend more money, with the hopes of a continued improvement in the economy for the foreseeable future.
According to monthly data released by credit card and financial institutions, the total amount of debt from consumer credit cards totaled $531 billion as of April 2012, as sourced from the NCCT Report released by Equifax. This - when compared to the same report stating a total amount of $730 billion in January 2009 - shows a huge decrease in the level of debt in the past three years.
Another encouraging sign is the level of debt versus consumers when it comes to retail credit cards. The amount of spending has remained the same over the past three years when compared on a seasonal basis, but the number of credit card holders has increased by nearly 5 percent in the past year and a half alone. The result is a per-capita decrease in the amount of retail credit card debt of roughly 10%, with more credit available on the market than at any time in the past three years.
It would appear that the credit card debt problem in the United States is slowly resolving itself through the habits of consumers taking it upon themselves to correct the overspending that ran rampant for the better part of two decades in their personal lives. The collective result is just one factor in how the overall economy is slowly but steadily improving.