Actually it just ended under his watch in June 2009, half a year after taking office, a few months after the stimulus and 9 months after the bailout: http://www.nber.org/cycles/sept2010.html

9/20/2010 1:13:56 PM

i already did this fyi

9/20/2010 1:17:32 PM

I see what you did there: /message_topic.aspx?topic=500489&page=42

[Edited on September 20, 2010 at 1:23 PM. Reason : IBTL

9/20/2010 1:23:11 PM

Quote :

"The committee decided that any future downturn of the economy would be a new recession and not a continuation of the recession that began in December 2007. The basis for this decision was the length and strength of the recovery to date."

$10 to anyone that starts the parody thread...
"Obama Starts New Recession with Failed Policies"

or future date after the election...

"Republican Congress Inherits Recession from Obama"

9/20/2010 4:32:33 PM

this is no comfort to friends of mine who are struggling to keep their homes cause they cant find work

when will obama deliver the HOPE and CHANGE he promised?

9/20/2010 4:51:00 PM

The dow is 5 digits. Recession OVER right?

9/20/2010 4:56:22 PM

^The Dow fell below 10K during the recession and it was still below 10K when it ended; it went above 10K shortly afterward and briefly dipped below again before coming back up recently. More important however is that the NBER, after waiting for the latest revisions to lots of difficult-to-determine statistics (not just or even primarily the DJIA), finally determined the endpoint.

Quote :

"when will obama deliver the HOPE and CHANGE he promised?"

IMO he has done as well as he could; unfortunately the liberal coalition in Congress was not large enough to avoid compromising with those who seek the further deterioration of the economy for all but the very wealthiest.

9/20/2010 5:09:46 PM

Sweet. When does the depression end?

9/20/2010 5:11:53 PM

shallow

and

pedantic

9/20/2010 5:13:10 PM

Quote :

"IMO he has done as well as he could; unfortunately the liberal coalition in Congress was not large enough to avoid compromising with those who seek the further deterioration of the economy for all but the very wealthiest."

And what miracle law was he going to pass that would have brought back prosperity? Best I can figure, every piece of legislation he did pass did nothing but prolong the recession, so forgive me if I doubt his next bill would have not only had the reverse outcome, but miraculously so.

9/20/2010 5:22:41 PM

lewl

the stimulus brought it to end earlier, and a bigger stimulus (and one less loaded with tax cuts) would have worked better

also the bailout (which was not passed during the Obama Administration, although he did vote for and publicly support it) staved off Great Depression Part II: Electric Boogaloo

finally, d357r0y3r, the last depression was over by 1942 thanks to military Keynesianism, although in much of the world the Great Depression ended in the late '30s

9/20/2010 5:40:10 PM

You're in for a shock, I'm sorry to say. The bailout did not "stave off" the depression. What it did do is make investment bankers rich at the expense of the people, while sewing the seeds for an even greater depression. If you really believe that we've recovered, I suggest buying bonds.

9/20/2010 5:54:18 PM

^^ And there is much evidence that WW2 actually did not end the Great Depression. The war industry grew dramatically, there is no doubt, but the rest of the private sector actually shrank further during the war. It was not until after FDR's death and the defeat of the New Dealers in Congress, leading to dramatic spending cuts and budget surpluses, that private investment returned, causing a private sector boom and post-war recovery.

Stimulus has never been shown to work, not even in WW2. However, a Republican run Congress and surpluses, as was enjoyed immediately after the war, did work.

9/20/2010 7:38:30 PM

Quote :

"The dow is 5 digits. Recession OVER right? irrelevant"

I'm sure the 17m unemployed right now are ecstatic that their troubles are over.

9/20/2010 7:55:37 PM

http://money.cnn.com/2010/09/20/news/economy/recession_over/index.htm?hpt=T1&iref=BN1&hpt=Sbin

Quote :

"Recession officially ended in June 2009 NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- The Great Recession ended in June 2009, according to the body charged with dating when economic downturns begin and end. But the news is little comfort to the millions of Americans still out of work, underwater on their mortgages or uncertain about the future. The National Bureau of Economic Research, an independent group of economists, released a statement Monday saying economic data now clearly point to the economy turning higher last summer. That makes the 18-month recession that started in December 2007 the longest and deepest downturn for the U.S. economy since the Great Depression. Still, weaker economic data over the past few months have led to rising fears of a double-dip recession. The forecast of top economists surveyed recently by CNNMoney was that there is a 25% risk of a double-dip recession within the next year, up from a 15% chance just six months ago. In its statement, the NBER acknowledged the risk, but said "the committee decided that any future downturn of the economy would be a new recession and not a continuation of the recession that began in December 2007.""

Yeah, CNN had this as their front page story for a while today. But being official understandably has very little to do with how people feel.

9/20/2010 8:14:20 PM

Quote :

"I'm sure the 17m unemployed right now are ecstatic that their troubles are over."

lol

the NBER itself said that we're not out of the hole yet, they're just sure we won't start digging again any time soon

9/20/2010 8:25:38 PM

haha what a joke.

9/20/2010 9:50:35 PM

^^ I know, it just seems like a ridiculous metric. And they didn't even technically say we wouldn't begin digging again soon, they just said it'd be a "different" recession.

It is the same shuckin' and jivin' that gives us crap unemployment and inflation figures.

9/20/2010 10:58:58 PM

people who are confused by this don't understand calculus / derivatives

9/20/2010 11:13:14 PM

i am confused as to what i may or may not be confused by

9/21/2010 12:52:30 AM

^^^good point, I should have said "wouldn't have been starting"

^^the confusion also goes on the other side, like I'm fairly sure I once heard Bush (and also Obama) proclaim the good news when the rate of GDP growth had reached its low, which meant the second derivative was positive
by comparison "end of the recession" corresponds to the first derivative being positive
and the end of the recovery (the part that feels like the recession is over) corresponds to finally being better off than before the recession started, related to the actual value, the "zeroth" derivative

9/21/2010 2:30:35 AM

The expert economists also took 2 years to tell everybody we were in a Recession as well.

So excuse me if I don't pop the champagne in celebration that according to them the Recession is over, all it really means is we have stopped falling we aren't necessarily rising out of it. Its hit its trough.

9/21/2010 8:27:36 AM

Quote :

"Double-dip recessions are still relatively rare. The last one occurred in the United States when the 1980 recession was followed by another in 1981-82. The NBER waited until July 1981 to declare the end of the 1980 recession, which turned out to be the same month that it eventually determined the next recession had begun."

So maybe the double dip started yesterday?


I'm probably just naive, but what really surprised me about that article was the graph showing that we have a recession pretty much every 5 years.

9/21/2010 9:00:09 AM

Quote :

"I'm sure the 17m unemployed right now are ecstatic that their troubles are over. "

Mayhaps my sarcasm is too subtle

9/21/2010 9:00:34 AM

Funny how some here who are always objecting to methodology seem to have no objection to this:

Quote :

"There is no fixed rule about what weights the [Business Cycle Dating Committee] assigns to the various indicators, or about what other measures contribute information to the process."

http://www.nber.org/cycles/sept2010.html

[Edited on September 21, 2010 at 10:52 AM. Reason : SOCIAL SCIENCES! RAWR!!!1]

9/21/2010 10:50:27 AM