There are two ways an economy can grow:  it can increase the amount of work by its labor force or by increasing the productivity of its labor force.  Only by increasing one of these two things can an economy truly grow.  In the past 8 years, the US economy has grown significantly according to the GDP numbers that are published by Bureau of Economic Analysis.  Has the US labor force grown?  Not really.  Has productivity improved?  Not really.  So how has the economy grown so significantly?  I call it the paper growth of the 21st Century. 

All economic data have been pointing to a slowdown in the past decade, especially in the past year.  The response by the Federal Reserve and the US government has been to do whatever necessary to ensure that the GDP continues to increase.  The result has been short-sighted pumping of liquidity into the market to produce apparent growth without substance.  With interest rates so low, companies borrow money for the sole purpose of buying back stock to increase short-term stock prices and reward its executives.  There is no productivity gained with much of the borrowing.  This defeats the purpose of low interest rates and only serves to create a larger bubble.  And the more significant consequence is that companies are burdened with more debt in an economy that is shrinking, with no productivity gained to cover the interest payments.

But at least the executives will get their bonuses because of the increases in stock prices.

This type of growth serves the sole purpose of increasing the income gap between the wealthy and the rest of the country, digging a deeper hole for the economy.  Nearly the entire country is worse off than it was 8 years ago.  Income has not grown for many people, prices have increased significantly, and personal wealth in the form of real estate has dropped significantly (a large share of many Americans' wealth is in their home).