Even with the recent winding down of debt levels, consumer credit (excludes mortgage payments) as a percent of personal income has grown from 15.5% in 1975 to 20.6% in 2009 according to data by the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis and the Federal Reserve.
The data point most utilized by those who espouse the idea of a healthy consumer is the household debt service ratio (DSR), a metric that relates debtpayments to disposable personal income.