NEW YORK – The U.S. recession, which started in December 2007 ended in June 2009 and any future downturn would signal a new recession, according to the Business Cycle Dating Committee of the National Bureau of Economic Research.
“The recession lasted 18 months, which makes it the longest of any recession since World War II,” NBER said in a statement. “Previously the longest postwar recessions were those of 1973-75 and 1981-82, both of which lasted 16 months.”
Despite determining “a trough” that signaled the end of the recession in June 2009, “the committee did not conclude that economic conditions since that month have been favorable or that the economy has returned to operating at normal capacity. Rather, the committee determined only that the recession ended and a recovery began in that month.”
The definition of a recession, NBER reminded “is a period of falling economic activity spread across the economy, lasting more than a few months, normally visible in real GDP, real income, employment, industrial production, and wholesale-retail sales. The trough marks the end of the declining phase and the start of the rising phase of the business cycle. Economic activity is typically below normal in the early stages of an expansion, and it sometimes remains so well into the expansion.”
NBER also concluded that a future downturn would be a new recession and not a continuation of this recession, base on “the length and strength of the recovery to date.”
