Since 1953, the inflation-adjusted growth rate of debt owed by households and nonfinancial businesses has fallen, on average, about 2 percentage points at an annual rate in the year following a business cycle peak (as dated by the National Bureau of Economic Research, or NBER).
The inflation-adjusted slowdown in debt growth during the past year has been much more pronounced than in previous downturns: Annualized debt growth for households and nonfinancial businesses in the fourth quarter of 2008 (the most up-to-date reading) was, adjusted for inflation, about 7 percentage points slower than it was during the NBER-designated peak in the fourth quarter of 2007.