“The committee recognizes that the pandemic and the public health response have resulted in a downturn with different characteristics and dynamics than prior recessions,” the group said. “Nonetheless, it concluded that the unprecedented magnitude of the decline in employment and production, and its broad reach across the entire economy, warrants the designation of this episode as a recession, even if it turns out to be briefer than earlier contractions.”
Many economists believe the United States may already have exited the recession — or at least be on its way out.
Robert Gordon, a Northwestern University economist and a member of the dating committee, said that he would bet a recovery started in April or May, meaning that the recession would most likely last for only a couple of months. Even so, he said, labeling it a downturn was not a hard choice “because of the extraordinary depth.”
“There’s no way you can observe that happening and not call it a recession,” he said, while acknowledging that it was a very unusual one. “Nothing like it has ever happened.”
The National Bureau of Economic Research formally dates business cycles based on a range of economic markers, importantly gross domestic product and employment.
Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/06/08/business/economy/us-economy-recession-2020.html
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