On Thu, Jan 14, 2010 at 2:24 PM, Sam <[email protected]> wrote: > > On Thu, Jan 14, 2010 at 3:06 PM, Judah McAuley <[email protected]> >> >> You need to go back and look at your graph again. Those are not graphs >> of when recessions started and ended, those are graphs of other >> economic indicators and where they stood X number of months after the >> beginning of a recession. For instance, the 1990 recession (kind of a >> yellow/goldenrod color in your graph) only lasted 8 months. So when >> you are looking at the figures 24 months after the start of the 1990 >> recession, that recession has been over for 16 months already. > > And the 1990 line level off at 10 months and then gradually rises. > Only a two month lag.
Indeed. >> Which brings up an excellent point, which is that these graphs do not >> take into account the length of each of the recessions. A similar, and >> probably more useful, comparison would be start at the end point of >> each recession. How long did it take for job recovery after each >> recession ended? How quickly did economic output pick up after the end >> of the recession? > > Pinpointing the exact technical date of a recessions end is pointless > for this graph. We're looking at recovery in employment. You seem to > think the current recession is over yet jobs are still plummeting. > That's a jobless recovery and is worth less than nothing. I wouldn't say it is pointless. It is merely different. Recovery tends to happen after the end of a recession. If the recession is just recently over or not over at all, then we would not expect an upturn yet. But I do agree with you that the indicators, thus far, are that we bottomed out on the decrease of the GDP but we have not done a good job of expanding the job pool. And a jobless recovery is a lot better than still plummeting in free fall, I'd say. That said, we need to work to make things much much better. >> Employment, in particular, is known to be a lagging indicator. The GDP >> recovers first and then, after some unknown period, hiring tends to >> pick up as companies become less skittish about adding longer term >> costs. > > The GDP is still lower and has only recovered slightly from the > bottom. This makes it the worst of all listed. > >> The economy is not in good shape and jobs are in even worse shape, no >> doubt. But these graphs don't say what you seem to think they say. > > I think they're saying of all the recessions since 1948 this one is > the only one that gets worse not better over time I don't agree with your final point. All the recessions listed got worse over time and then got better. That's recovery. The question is, how long will it take, how much better will it get? Some folks argue that part of the job losses this go around were structural, meaning that they aren't coming back. I don't know enough to say. I think that the 2009 response to the recession is a bit tepid myself. They went for a minimal stimulus and didn't try to push a heavy set of changes and, as a consequence, results were weak. But things have stabilized and that's good. Now, will Congress and the White House be able to spur job creation in 2010? I don't know. I hope so. I have my doubts. But that is why I'm reserving opinion thus far. The previous guy was in charge for the lead up to the recession and the first 14 months of the recession. I'll give the new guy awhile to see what he can do turning things around and then make a judgement. Juda ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Want to reach the ColdFusion community with something they want? Let them know on the House of Fusion mailing lists Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:310591 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.5
