The very definition of excessive finance

"Financial Sectors" as a percent of "All Sectors" (Debt Securities and Loans; Liability, Level) Logged Values:

Graph #1

I added trend lines by eye, in Excel. As I am not an economist it is perfectly okay to do that.

Were I to put dates on it, 'twould be as follows:

• Trend 1:  Q4 1951 - Q4 1974
• Trend 2:  Q4 1976 - Q4 2002
• Trend 3:  Q4 2002 - Q2 2009
• Trend 4:  Q2 2011 - Q4 2018

Q4 2018 is end-of-data.

Using Excel's "Size and Position" option to examine the trend lines -- as I said: I'm not an economist, so it's okay -- turns up the following:

The graph of those slope values shows downward progress:

Graph #2

but that was obvious from the start. Looking at the numbers, though, I can say that the Trend 2 growth rate is only about 72% of the Trend 1 growth rate. And it's all downhill from there. (I didn't check this but I'm pretty sure I'd get the same 72% number if I looked at the values in a more respectable manner.)

So what can we conclude from this? I'm thinkin: Excessive finance doesn't just drag down the economy. It even drags down finance.

There's a lesson in that, I think.