The recession is so 2009. No, seriously. The recession ended in June 2009, 18 months after it began in December 2007, according to The Business Cycle Dating Committee of the National Bureau of Economic Research. But the eight economists who make up the group say the economy is not back to normal by any means. Rather, they say, a “trough” in business activity occurred in June 2009 marking the end of a declining phase and the start of the rising phase of the business cycle.
Economic activity, including GDP, employment, income, industrial production and wholesale-retail sales, is “typically below normal in early stages of an expansion, and sometimes remains so well into the expansion.” In other words, we've been out of the downward spiral for over a year but it may be awhile before the economy is in decent shape. And if there is any future downturn in the economy, the committee says that would be considered a new recession and not a continuation of the one that began in 2007.
