Thursday, November 19, 2009

Deep Hole

From Washington Post

Digging out of a deep hole

There's a reason people are calling it the Great Recession. The economic downturn that began in December 2007 has been the most severe since World War II. Although economic output finally resumed expanding this summer, the nation still has a deep hole to dig out of before returning to prosperity. By some of the tangible measures -- how many people have jobs, how much they're consuming and how much industries are producing -- economic activity remains depressed. That's especially clear when the downturn is compared with the four recessions that preceded it. (None of the downturns rival the Great Depression, but the charts below do not include it; comparable data isn't available.) These sobering measures were reflected earlier this week by Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke, who offered a gloomy view of what lies ahead.
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