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Wikipedia has blocked editing ‘recession’ as people change definition

135 points by nailer 4y ago

mypastself 4y ago
Relatedly, PolitiFact has partnered up with Facebook to “combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed”. They’ve recently flagged a video that used an online dictionary definition of “recession”: https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2022/jul/27/instagram-posts/no-white-house-didnt-change-definition-recession/ https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2022/jul/27/instagram-... Whether or not the U.S. is actually in a recession might still be up for debate. But I’d argue that it’s pretty clear what’s happening to the credibility of online “fact-checking” sources.
- rvz 4y ago
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - Ekaros 4y ago
    Can someone explain me what is so horrible about country being in recession? They do happen regularly and are normal part of our modern economy. Wouldn't it be just better to accept the situation and present solutions for moving forward?
    - sokoloff 4y ago
      The party in power (happens to be Democrats right now) tends to get re-elected when there is not a recession and tends not to when there is. It’s politically bad for an incumbent party to have a recession, but otherwise perfectly normal, natural, and even healthy for the economy to usually grow but sometimes contract. I have to laugh a bit as I think “maybe I won’t get wet as long as the weather reporter doesn’t declare it’s a rainstorm…”
      - jokethrowaway 4y ago
        I think it's more interesting to understand why recession happen and why are we condemned to an eternal cycle of boom and bust and growing inequality between the top 0.1% and the rest. I blame governments messing with currencies and with markets. Not that I believe one party or another will fix things, the theft from the elite is bound to grow bigger and bigger (like our spending) until a soviet union style collapse and a return to poverty and free market capitalism.
      - willcipriano 4y ago
        A big critism of Democrat policy is that it would cause a recession, so it is particularly bad for them to go into a election while they are in power and one has started.
        sokoloff 4y ago
        If that’s the case, they’re in for a bad mid-term as I can’t see any reasonable way of torturing the data to get it to confess to continued real economic growth through 2022. In that regard, they might be better off to “get it over with”, take a beating in the mid-terms, and hope to salvage the 2024 election. (I say this as no fan of either major party.)
    - tenpies 4y ago
  - shapefrog 4y ago
    They didnt change anything now - the NBER definition is unchanged, and the "online dictionary" continues to use generally identified by a fall in GDP in two successive quarters. Your aunt on facebook who knows someone on the inside is full of shit.
    - robertlagrant 4y ago
      I'm not clear on the Aunt reference but to my understanding the White House spokesperson and economic advisers have (very recently - last week or so) gone on record saying that 2 successive quarters is not and never has been the definition of a recession.
      - shapefrog 4y ago
        That would be because 2 successive quarters is not and never has been the definition of a recession in the US. A recession in the US is defined as when the NBER says it as a recession. > The NBER's traditional definition of a recession is that it is a significant decline in economic activity that is spread across the economy and that lasts more than a few months. The committee's view is that while each of the three criteria—depth, diffusion, and duration—needs to be met individually to some degree, extreme conditions revealed by one criterion may partially offset weaker indications from another ... Despite your claim to the contraty, the NBER guidence of what they believe constitutes a recession did not change "recently".
        CapricornNoble 4y ago
        >>>That would be because 2 successive quarters is not and never has been the definition of a recession. Perhaps explain that to the White House's own economic advisors, then? https://twitter.com/PhilipWegmann/status/1552365720721399817 https://twitter.com/PhilipWegmann/status/1552365720721399817
        lukas099 4y ago
        People say things, that doesn't change how the US officially defines a recession.
  - jeegsy 4y ago
    Thank you for actually addressing the matter at hand. I was looking for this in the comments. The question is why are we using a different standard from what we have been using, at least in popular understanding not philosophical musings about what is and isn't a recession or whether its good or natural.
- d3nj4l 4y ago
  What does your link have to do with what you're saying?
  - mypastself 4y ago
    The video in question uses a different (dictionary) definition of the term from the authors of the article. This is partly the justification for them declaring the video as false, and flagging it as potentially harmful misinformation. The overreaction alone is sufficient for me to question the website’s priorities.
    - mjburgess 4y ago
      The issue with the video, as explained in your article link, is its claim that the whitehouse is "changing the definition" of recession. That claim is false, and just propaganda. The WH may be using an official definition which is convenient for them, vs. some other that is also acceptable. That may be true. But they arent changing the definition of anything. Theyre actually using the standard one for the relevant area of expertise.
      - glenstein 4y ago
        >The issue with the video, as explained in your article link, is its claim that the whitehouse is "changing the definition" of recession. Thank you for taking the time to look at this, as the commenter had led me to believe PolitiFact was arguing about a totally different claim.
      - mypastself 4y ago
        I’m not defending the specific claim in question. I’m questioning why these websites tend to focus on addressing the most easily debunkable, literal aspects (or versions) of an argument, usually in favor of a particular political option. If there’s an article out there in which PolitiFact debunked (let alone flagged) claims of, say, “transitory inflation”, I’ll stand corrected.
        4y ago
- mellosouls 4y ago
  Unfortunately, there is no real objective agreement on Politifact's impartiality either. Impartiality generally seems to be a very difficult subject. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PolitiFact#Allegations_of_political_bias https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PolitiFact#Allegations_of_poli... PolitiFact was three times as likely to rank statements from Republicans as “Pants on Fire,” and twice as likely to rank statements from Democrats as “Entirely True.”
  - hobs 4y ago
    Nothing you said here or Wikipedia says demonstrates Politifact is wrong, just that they find Republicans lie more. That's not a point of bias unless you can prove Republicans lie less.
    - hbossy 4y ago
      It's more reasonable to assume that all politicians lie the same and "fact checkers" are biased against one party.
      - bildung 4y ago
        Why would you think that? It's clear that different political parties are driven by different value systems (more obviously in other countries than the US, but still), thus also quite plausable that those value systems differ in their judgement of the end justifying the means.
      - Spivak 4y ago
        That would probably your a priori assumption since that would be your motivation to do the study in the first place. But it's not some fundamental law of the universe, so you can't just count lies/total grouped by party and conclude bias. You have to prove that for the same claims politifact would rate Republican's worse and Democrats better or establish some kind of control. Because it's not necessarily either bais or that Republicans lie more, it could also be that politifact is asked to rate statements that are obvious lies by Republicans more often.
- geraldwhen 4y ago
  Fact checking has never been credible. You’re just now noticing.
  - selfhoster11 4y ago
    It would help people to notice that if it wasn't literally branding itself as the way to establish that information is credible.
- lukas099 4y ago
  Your post is technically true but misleading. They did flag a video that used an online dictionary definition of "recession." However, they didn't flag it for its definition. They flagged it for stating that the White House had changed its definition when it hadn't.
  - mypastself 4y ago
    They actually argue against two claims in the article, one of which is the correct definition of the term. Immediately after quoting the definition used by the video, the article states that they’ve flagged the video, which to me indicates it was an important part of why they flagged it. I do concede I should have been clearer in my original comment.
    - lukas099 4y ago
      The NBER's definition and Siri's definition are not even in conflict. As PolitiFact states: > [T]he definition read by Siri [...] includes an important word that the narrator glosses over, namely "generally." In other words, the one-sentence definition Siri provided is not a closed answer. It’s a general guidance that includes exceptions. PolitiFact does discuss why the NBER definition is more nuanced than the 2-quarter heuristic, but this is mere exposition behind their main point.
- secondhandle 4y ago
  Huh? First 5 seconds of the video: "So the White House is now trying to protect Joe Biden by changing the definition of the word recession" Content of the video: Uses siri's definition which states a recession is "...generally identified by a fall in GDP in two successive quarters." The poster ignores the 'generally' when comparing to the White House website which states that the two quarter definition is not official. Followed by a rap battle meme. Obvious intent of video: Paints a narrative that the white house is changing definitions of words to fit their needs. Title of the politifact article: "No, the White House didn’t change the definition of “recession” " Content of the politifact article: The white house didn't change the definition of recession. Reality: The White House didn't change the definition of recession. So what exactly is the credibility issue here?
przemub 4y ago
Good. There's no need to make Wikipedia even more U.S.-centric, not to mention current-U.S.-politics-centric...
- xiphias2 4y ago
  I agree with you, and it's not simply US vs non-US, but changing the definition just after 2 negative quarters in the US can be thought of a politically motivated change. Also only one of the two definitions is objective (the non-political one).
  - notahacker 4y ago
    But the definitions haven't changed, either on Wikipedia or the definitions used by the US government and most of the rest of the world respectively. What has changed is the ability for new accounts to edit war the definition due to recent debate in the US
    - ajsnigrutin 4y ago
      But people are changing the definition on wikipedia, that's why the editing in disabled for new accounts. Why? Because it's an election year in USA, recession is here, biden says it's not ( https://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/biden-says-no-surprise-economy-slowing-down-economy-enters-technical-recession https://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/biden-says-no-surprise-... ), and definitions "have to be changed" for bidens words to be "true". So, one side changes, the other side changes back, then again and again...
      - ChrisLomont 4y ago
        >definitions "have to be changed" for bidens words to be "true" I think that's backwards from reality. The definition used in the US for decades (the NBER one, founded 1920) would say no recession yet. The naive, yet incorrect, definition some people want to change to (2 quarters) would make it a recession.
trention 4y ago
>create fact-checking and supposedly neutral "services"/media >due to selection bias, those "services" and the people providing them end up being heavily on one side of the political spectrum >deus ex machina (no, not really) >wonder why people on the other side of the political spectrum refuse to trust your fact-checking "services"/media
- throwawayacc2 4y ago
  I don’t understand why this is being downvoted. I was literally told this by multiple people. Hell, even I have this feeling. I’m not even american and I know fact checking is done by liberals for liberals.
  - VancouverMan 4y ago
    It fell victim to the very same phenomenon it is describing. Online user-generated-content moderation systems (whether upvoting/downvoting, Slashdot-style, etc.) are just a type of "fact-checking" in practice. When the ability/opportunity to act as a moderator within such a system depends on conforming with the community, then biases can become repeatedly amplified over time, and the results of such moderation become questionable to a sizable part of the population.
- silent_cal 4y ago
  Tech is an isolated bubble politically speaking, but I'm surprised to see how many people see through it here on HN.
  - trention 4y ago
    My first work visit to silicon valley was during the democratic primaries in 2016. Most people there were supporting Bernie Sanders. While me, being from Eastern Europe, could see through him quite easily. I pretty much made all the inferences I will ever need about the valley-type demographics back then. Nothing since has disproved any of them.
  - shillsheepy 4y ago
_8j50 4y ago
Unpopular opinion: Declaring the economy in or out if recession does not help anyone outside of propagandists and journalists. High corporate profits and high inflation. Those need to be addressed regardless of recession or not. If you call it one, they will use it as cause for even more layoffs and price hikes if you don't they will use it as reason to avoid measures to regulate their greed because afterall their greed is preventing a recession. Truth is we will have to wait until 2023 or later to call this a recession. My suspicion is this is all wallstreet's shenanigans. There is a growing labor rights movement and this climate makes it hard to pass any laws that support the movement. "Minimum wage caused low profits and an unrecoverable bear market" is the sentiment they want to spread (by they I mean the market makers and investment bankers of wallstreet).
- refurb 4y ago
  High corporate profits and high inflation. Those need to be addressed regardless of recession or not. I'm sorry what? Profits now need to be reduced? That seem the opposite of economic growth.
  - CoffeeCollector 4y ago
    These companies keep demanding more and more and more from employees and their customers. When will they be satisfied?? We fostered their development and need now to reap from them.
  - saurik 4y ago
    In a functioning capitalist market economy, profit margins (which I believe is what is being described here) would generally be low due to competition, and would only spike momentarily due to innovation. If a company consistently has high profits, something is fishy, and maybe they have a monopoly (which sadly seems to happen almost accidentally just from branding, as humans are poor market participants and will refuse a perfectly good alternative if it doesn't have a fancy name on it)... if everyone is making high profits and are even increasing their profits, I think (look: I am not an economist; I just have severe insomnia) that is indicating something is wrong with the labor market or the money supply.
raptor99 4y ago
https://archive.ph/qiMYw https://archive.ph/qiMYw
DarkmSparks 4y ago
Despite knowing I shouldn't, I actually find this fight highly amusing in a black comedy kind of way. Reminds me of the fight over the Titanics last lifeboat. Everyone knows its all broken, that already no one can pay their debts, millions are homeless and US interests have started their march to double digits. But the most important thing right now is to scrape a few more moments believing there is hope by redefining the meaning of proper fked.
- epakai 4y ago
  Things aren't "proper fucked" though. Supply chains were just too slow to recover to meet our demand. Lots of things were overpriced/overvalued. The economy is going to retract as a result. Things will cycle once more, and we can do it all over in another n decade(s).
  - rhodorhoades 4y ago
    Worldwide inflation numbers[1], general animosity among world powers[2], wars in trade and land , global debts rising above GDP everywhere, does not bode well for social peace. There will be revolutions worldwide if this trend continues and if history rhymes. 1. Middle East, SE Asia, and South America all have inflation above 50%. 2. Russia vs west. China vs. the US (Taiwan) Turkey vs. Iran (Syria, Armenia) Venezuela vs. itself
    - DIARRHEA_xd 4y ago
      > 1. Middle East, SE Asia, and South America all have inflation above 50%. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2022/06/15/in-the-u-s-and-around-the-world-inflation-is-high-and-getting-higher/ft_22-06-08_globalinflation_1/ https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2022/06/15/in-the-u-s-... This source is lacking, but the only countries above 50% inflation I can find are Turkey and Argentina. Could you point me in the direction of where you got your numbers?
      - DIARRHEA_xd 4y ago
lukas099 4y ago
What is the point here? It sounds like Wikipedia editors are doing their job of cooling off an edit war on a hot-button issue.
- nsv 4y ago
  To me, it's surprising that whether or not we're in a recession could be a hot button issue.
  - SilasX 4y ago
    This. The stakes feel so low to me. Just about every president deals with a recession. Having a recession in your term is not a black mark of shame! If anything, I'd be more worried if a president didn't have any recession in their reign, as that would mean something else is being manipulated. The attempt to suddenly change it now feels quixotic.
  - beeboop 4y ago
    Considering we're leading into elections, it's extremely hot button.
dubbel 4y ago
> The editor discredited rumors that Wikipedia had removed mention of two quarters of negative GDP growth from its recession definition and said any screenshots implying so are outdated. This article reports accurately (as far as I can tell) what different people are saying/tweeting about the issue, but stops short of confirming themselves whether or not the definitions were actually changed recently. Which is easily possible using the version history (maybe with a "according to the version history" disclaimer). Instead readers have to rely on the quote from the Wikipedia editor, which some people probably won't.
- s1artibartfast 4y ago
  Yeah, I found this very confusing. It didn't clarify what state it was locked at. Was it an older state, or a new one with several edits incorporated? This leaves people to make their own conclusions based on the priors.
mbg721 4y ago
'Recession' is much better defined than 'depression'; I don't think people use dictionary-definitions to define their economic state just because the TV told them to.
Ligma123 4y ago
Not sure if the article mentions it, but people changed the definition of the word "definition" to suit their agenda.
vfclists 4y ago
bradhe 4y ago
Love the dichotomy of the internet at play with this story. Over on r/conservative they're losing their minds over the fact that Wikipedia is changing the definition of "recession" on their site.
- nailer 4y ago
  How is that a dichotomy?
  - bradhe 4y ago
    Wikipedia is the good guy on HN. Wikipedia is the bad guy on r/conservative. Where they fall is based on your world view.
    - nailer 4y ago
      I like Wikipedia as a project, but feel they're done a really poor job of telling people: > It looks like you're selecting something from Wikipedia! Remember, Wikipedia isn't a source - cite the source Wikipedia uses instead, and don't cite unsourced information at all!
jug 4y ago
It isn't blocked, just semi-protected so that you can't abuse the article with new accounts. (article title has this information but not the submission title) I'd like to add that this is a common move Wikipedia does for "hot" articles to alleviate some moderation pressure.
jesuslop 4y ago
Wikipedia should have a "controversial" warning for heavy editing
- s1artibartfast 4y ago
  It does have that functionality and you can see it on many other pages.
realityking 4y ago
Iu l
Kim_Bruning 4y ago
I'm not sure why this is news, really. Topics that are currently heavily debated/ in the news may lead to a low s/n ratio on wikipedia. Those topics temporarily can get locked; as one of a spectrum of measures that can be used to remedy these kinds of situation. It happens many times a day.
m0llusk 4y ago
It appears to be different this time. No, really. Recessions in general see GDP down and unemployment up. Right now GDP is down but employment is also down. This could potentially prevent or limit the impact of the recessionary cycle where layoffs reduce demand which brings down profits and GDP. Additionally, corporate profits and cash reserves are high while low labor force participation and problems hiring are making layoffs undesirable. While consumer confidence is down economic demand remains high at least for now. All this shows the current economic situation to be extremely unusual and quite apart from previous recessions whether it gets labeled as such or not.
- simonh 4y ago
  >Recessions in general see GDP down and unemployment up. Right now GDP is down but employment is also down... I think you mean unemployment is also down? Also work force participation is currently high, not low. But I get what you're saying, it's a very unusual situation. I think that's because this has nothing to do with the usual economic cycle. It's a very bouncy snap-back from the lockdown that's seen a boom in demand, a bust in supply, heavy stimulus. The feedback relationships between the economic indicators just aren't working as they usually do. Personally I think this recession will be relatively short. As I said it's overcorrections from the snap back after the pandemic, but things will settle down. That doesn't mean there won't be pain, there will, but hopefully it will be fairly short term.
mywittyname 4y ago
Check this out: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/GDP https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/GDP 1960Q2-1960Q3 - GDP grew, yet this is flagged as a recession. 1981Q3-1983Q1 - GPD grew consistently the entire time, yet this is one of the longer recessions on record. 1990Q3-1991Q2 - GDP only dropped for one quarter, then quickly rebounded, yet it is flagged as a long recession. 2020Q1-2020Q1 - This is flagged as recession, despite being less than a single quarter. By "two consecutive quarters definition, this recession started in 2019Q4 and lasted until 2021Q1. Yet the NBER doesn't flag it this way. If they were "playing politics," they would definitely have made this out to be a larger deal. It's pretty clear the NBER has never relied entirely on GDP data to determine recessions. Otherwise, there wouldn't be so many recessions with GDP growth.
- gruez 4y ago
  > Check this out: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/GDP https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/GDP Check this out: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/A939RX0Q048SBEA https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/A939RX0Q048SBEA (adjusted for inflation, adjusted for population).
  - mywittyname 4y ago
    The argument is the definition is just GDP growth. Not inflation and per capital adjusted GDP growth. Hence, why I posted the chart I did. But even with that chart, none of the previous three recessions started with, 'two consecutive quarters of GDP decline.' They may have been preceded by it, but that does not mark the start of any of those recessions. By that definition, the great financial crisis started in 2007Q2, which would be well over a year before the collapse of AIG and Lehman. There's ample evidence on that chart that the NBER has remained consistent with their definitions over the year. Otherwise, the previous recession would have started at least a quarter earlier.
- areyousure 4y ago
  In case anyone was curious, here are the numbers from the provided link around a couple of the time periods indicated: > 1960Q2-1960Q3 - GDP grew, yet this is flagged as a recession. 1960-01-01: 542.648 1960-04-01: 541.08 1960-07-01: 545.604 1960-10-01: 540.197 1961-01-01: 545.018 > 2020Q1-2020Q1 - This is flagged as recession, despite being less than a single quarter. By "two consecutive quarters definition, this recession started in 2019Q4 and lasted until 2021Q1. 2019-10-01: 21694.458 2020-01-01: 21481.367 2020-04-01: 19477.444 2020-07-01: 21138.574 2020-10-01: 21477.597 2021-01-01: 22038.226
egberts1 4y ago
If you don’t like the most commonly used economic word, “change the goal post”.
bArray 4y ago
There's been a lot of redefinition recently. It's most definitely by design. The only thing to be argued is whether it is done so wrongfully or rightfully. The UK government for example recently price-capped certain products that are used to measure inflation. At least this redefinition in the US is more public. Ultimately, gate-keep the definition all you like. The cost of living has pushed the working class to the breaking point, it doesn't matter what you call that - the experience is most definitely real.
RickJWagner 4y ago
Last week I talked to an intern looking for a position and a programmer that had their job eliminated. That's two involuntary job hunters more than I've seen in a long time. I think a recession is here.

135 points by nailer 4y ago

Relatedly, PolitiFact has partnered up with Facebook to “combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed”. They’ve recently flagged a video that used an online dictionary definition of “recession”: https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2022/jul/27/instagram-posts/no-white-house-didnt-change-definition-recession/ https://www.politifact.com/factchecks/2022/jul/27/instagram-... Whether or not the U.S. is actually in a recession might still be up for debate. But I’d argue that it’s pretty clear what’s happening to the credibility of online “fact-checking” sources.

rvz 4y ago
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- Ekaros 4y ago
  Can someone explain me what is so horrible about country being in recession? They do happen regularly and are normal part of our modern economy. Wouldn't it be just better to accept the situation and present solutions for moving forward?
  - sokoloff 4y ago
    The party in power (happens to be Democrats right now) tends to get re-elected when there is not a recession and tends not to when there is. It’s politically bad for an incumbent party to have a recession, but otherwise perfectly normal, natural, and even healthy for the economy to usually grow but sometimes contract. I have to laugh a bit as I think “maybe I won’t get wet as long as the weather reporter doesn’t declare it’s a rainstorm…”
    - jokethrowaway 4y ago
      I think it's more interesting to understand why recession happen and why are we condemned to an eternal cycle of boom and bust and growing inequality between the top 0.1% and the rest. I blame governments messing with currencies and with markets. Not that I believe one party or another will fix things, the theft from the elite is bound to grow bigger and bigger (like our spending) until a soviet union style collapse and a return to poverty and free market capitalism.
    - willcipriano 4y ago
      A big critism of Democrat policy is that it would cause a recession, so it is particularly bad for them to go into a election while they are in power and one has started.
      - sokoloff 4y ago
        If that’s the case, they’re in for a bad mid-term as I can’t see any reasonable way of torturing the data to get it to confess to continued real economic growth through 2022. In that regard, they might be better off to “get it over with”, take a beating in the mid-terms, and hope to salvage the 2024 election. (I say this as no fan of either major party.)
  - tenpies 4y ago
- shapefrog 4y ago
  They didnt change anything now - the NBER definition is unchanged, and the "online dictionary" continues to use generally identified by a fall in GDP in two successive quarters. Your aunt on facebook who knows someone on the inside is full of shit.
  - robertlagrant 4y ago
    I'm not clear on the Aunt reference but to my understanding the White House spokesperson and economic advisers have (very recently - last week or so) gone on record saying that 2 successive quarters is not and never has been the definition of a recession.
    - shapefrog 4y ago
      That would be because 2 successive quarters is not and never has been the definition of a recession in the US. A recession in the US is defined as when the NBER says it as a recession. > The NBER's traditional definition of a recession is that it is a significant decline in economic activity that is spread across the economy and that lasts more than a few months. The committee's view is that while each of the three criteria—depth, diffusion, and duration—needs to be met individually to some degree, extreme conditions revealed by one criterion may partially offset weaker indications from another ... Despite your claim to the contraty, the NBER guidence of what they believe constitutes a recession did not change "recently".
      - CapricornNoble 4y ago
        >>>That would be because 2 successive quarters is not and never has been the definition of a recession. Perhaps explain that to the White House's own economic advisors, then? https://twitter.com/PhilipWegmann/status/1552365720721399817 https://twitter.com/PhilipWegmann/status/1552365720721399817
        lukas099 4y ago
        People say things, that doesn't change how the US officially defines a recession.
- jeegsy 4y ago
  Thank you for actually addressing the matter at hand. I was looking for this in the comments. The question is why are we using a different standard from what we have been using, at least in popular understanding not philosophical musings about what is and isn't a recession or whether its good or natural.
d3nj4l 4y ago
What does your link have to do with what you're saying?
- mypastself 4y ago
  The video in question uses a different (dictionary) definition of the term from the authors of the article. This is partly the justification for them declaring the video as false, and flagging it as potentially harmful misinformation. The overreaction alone is sufficient for me to question the website’s priorities.
  - mjburgess 4y ago
    The issue with the video, as explained in your article link, is its claim that the whitehouse is "changing the definition" of recession. That claim is false, and just propaganda. The WH may be using an official definition which is convenient for them, vs. some other that is also acceptable. That may be true. But they arent changing the definition of anything. Theyre actually using the standard one for the relevant area of expertise.
    - glenstein 4y ago
      >The issue with the video, as explained in your article link, is its claim that the whitehouse is "changing the definition" of recession. Thank you for taking the time to look at this, as the commenter had led me to believe PolitiFact was arguing about a totally different claim.
    - mypastself 4y ago
      I’m not defending the specific claim in question. I’m questioning why these websites tend to focus on addressing the most easily debunkable, literal aspects (or versions) of an argument, usually in favor of a particular political option. If there’s an article out there in which PolitiFact debunked (let alone flagged) claims of, say, “transitory inflation”, I’ll stand corrected.
      - 4y ago
mellosouls 4y ago
Unfortunately, there is no real objective agreement on Politifact's impartiality either. Impartiality generally seems to be a very difficult subject. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PolitiFact#Allegations_of_political_bias https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PolitiFact#Allegations_of_poli... PolitiFact was three times as likely to rank statements from Republicans as “Pants on Fire,” and twice as likely to rank statements from Democrats as “Entirely True.”
- hobs 4y ago
  Nothing you said here or Wikipedia says demonstrates Politifact is wrong, just that they find Republicans lie more. That's not a point of bias unless you can prove Republicans lie less.
  - hbossy 4y ago
    It's more reasonable to assume that all politicians lie the same and "fact checkers" are biased against one party.
    - bildung 4y ago
      Why would you think that? It's clear that different political parties are driven by different value systems (more obviously in other countries than the US, but still), thus also quite plausable that those value systems differ in their judgement of the end justifying the means.
    - Spivak 4y ago
      That would probably your a priori assumption since that would be your motivation to do the study in the first place. But it's not some fundamental law of the universe, so you can't just count lies/total grouped by party and conclude bias. You have to prove that for the same claims politifact would rate Republican's worse and Democrats better or establish some kind of control. Because it's not necessarily either bais or that Republicans lie more, it could also be that politifact is asked to rate statements that are obvious lies by Republicans more often.
geraldwhen 4y ago
Fact checking has never been credible. You’re just now noticing.
- selfhoster11 4y ago
  It would help people to notice that if it wasn't literally branding itself as the way to establish that information is credible.
lukas099 4y ago
Your post is technically true but misleading. They did flag a video that used an online dictionary definition of "recession." However, they didn't flag it for its definition. They flagged it for stating that the White House had changed its definition when it hadn't.
- mypastself 4y ago
  They actually argue against two claims in the article, one of which is the correct definition of the term. Immediately after quoting the definition used by the video, the article states that they’ve flagged the video, which to me indicates it was an important part of why they flagged it. I do concede I should have been clearer in my original comment.
  - lukas099 4y ago
    The NBER's definition and Siri's definition are not even in conflict. As PolitiFact states: > [T]he definition read by Siri [...] includes an important word that the narrator glosses over, namely "generally." In other words, the one-sentence definition Siri provided is not a closed answer. It’s a general guidance that includes exceptions. PolitiFact does discuss why the NBER definition is more nuanced than the 2-quarter heuristic, but this is mere exposition behind their main point.
secondhandle 4y ago
Huh? First 5 seconds of the video: "So the White House is now trying to protect Joe Biden by changing the definition of the word recession" Content of the video: Uses siri's definition which states a recession is "...generally identified by a fall in GDP in two successive quarters." The poster ignores the 'generally' when comparing to the White House website which states that the two quarter definition is not official. Followed by a rap battle meme. Obvious intent of video: Paints a narrative that the white house is changing definitions of words to fit their needs. Title of the politifact article: "No, the White House didn’t change the definition of “recession” " Content of the politifact article: The white house didn't change the definition of recession. Reality: The White House didn't change the definition of recession. So what exactly is the credibility issue here?

przemub 4y ago

Good. There's no need to make Wikipedia even more U.S.-centric, not to mention current-U.S.-politics-centric...

xiphias2 4y ago
I agree with you, and it's not simply US vs non-US, but changing the definition just after 2 negative quarters in the US can be thought of a politically motivated change. Also only one of the two definitions is objective (the non-political one).
- notahacker 4y ago
  But the definitions haven't changed, either on Wikipedia or the definitions used by the US government and most of the rest of the world respectively. What has changed is the ability for new accounts to edit war the definition due to recent debate in the US
  - ajsnigrutin 4y ago
    But people are changing the definition on wikipedia, that's why the editing in disabled for new accounts. Why? Because it's an election year in USA, recession is here, biden says it's not ( https://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/biden-says-no-surprise-economy-slowing-down-economy-enters-technical-recession https://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/biden-says-no-surprise-... ), and definitions "have to be changed" for bidens words to be "true". So, one side changes, the other side changes back, then again and again...
    - ChrisLomont 4y ago
      >definitions "have to be changed" for bidens words to be "true" I think that's backwards from reality. The definition used in the US for decades (the NBER one, founded 1920) would say no recession yet. The naive, yet incorrect, definition some people want to change to (2 quarters) would make it a recession.

trention 4y ago

>create fact-checking and supposedly neutral "services"/media >due to selection bias, those "services" and the people providing them end up being heavily on one side of the political spectrum >deus ex machina (no, not really) >wonder why people on the other side of the political spectrum refuse to trust your fact-checking "services"/media

throwawayacc2 4y ago
I don’t understand why this is being downvoted. I was literally told this by multiple people. Hell, even I have this feeling. I’m not even american and I know fact checking is done by liberals for liberals.
- VancouverMan 4y ago
  It fell victim to the very same phenomenon it is describing. Online user-generated-content moderation systems (whether upvoting/downvoting, Slashdot-style, etc.) are just a type of "fact-checking" in practice. When the ability/opportunity to act as a moderator within such a system depends on conforming with the community, then biases can become repeatedly amplified over time, and the results of such moderation become questionable to a sizable part of the population.
silent_cal 4y ago
Tech is an isolated bubble politically speaking, but I'm surprised to see how many people see through it here on HN.
- trention 4y ago
  My first work visit to silicon valley was during the democratic primaries in 2016. Most people there were supporting Bernie Sanders. While me, being from Eastern Europe, could see through him quite easily. I pretty much made all the inferences I will ever need about the valley-type demographics back then. Nothing since has disproved any of them.
- shillsheepy 4y ago

_8j50 4y ago

Unpopular opinion: Declaring the economy in or out if recession does not help anyone outside of propagandists and journalists. High corporate profits and high inflation. Those need to be addressed regardless of recession or not. If you call it one, they will use it as cause for even more layoffs and price hikes if you don't they will use it as reason to avoid measures to regulate their greed because afterall their greed is preventing a recession. Truth is we will have to wait until 2023 or later to call this a recession. My suspicion is this is all wallstreet's shenanigans. There is a growing labor rights movement and this climate makes it hard to pass any laws that support the movement. "Minimum wage caused low profits and an unrecoverable bear market" is the sentiment they want to spread (by they I mean the market makers and investment bankers of wallstreet).

refurb 4y ago
High corporate profits and high inflation. Those need to be addressed regardless of recession or not. I'm sorry what? Profits now need to be reduced? That seem the opposite of economic growth.
- CoffeeCollector 4y ago
  These companies keep demanding more and more and more from employees and their customers. When will they be satisfied?? We fostered their development and need now to reap from them.
- saurik 4y ago
  In a functioning capitalist market economy, profit margins (which I believe is what is being described here) would generally be low due to competition, and would only spike momentarily due to innovation. If a company consistently has high profits, something is fishy, and maybe they have a monopoly (which sadly seems to happen almost accidentally just from branding, as humans are poor market participants and will refuse a perfectly good alternative if it doesn't have a fancy name on it)... if everyone is making high profits and are even increasing their profits, I think (look: I am not an economist; I just have severe insomnia) that is indicating something is wrong with the labor market or the money supply.

raptor99 4y ago

https://archive.ph/qiMYw https://archive.ph/qiMYw

DarkmSparks 4y ago

Despite knowing I shouldn't, I actually find this fight highly amusing in a black comedy kind of way. Reminds me of the fight over the Titanics last lifeboat. Everyone knows its all broken, that already no one can pay their debts, millions are homeless and US interests have started their march to double digits. But the most important thing right now is to scrape a few more moments believing there is hope by redefining the meaning of proper fked.

epakai 4y ago
Things aren't "proper fucked" though. Supply chains were just too slow to recover to meet our demand. Lots of things were overpriced/overvalued. The economy is going to retract as a result. Things will cycle once more, and we can do it all over in another n decade(s).
- rhodorhoades 4y ago
  Worldwide inflation numbers[1], general animosity among world powers[2], wars in trade and land , global debts rising above GDP everywhere, does not bode well for social peace. There will be revolutions worldwide if this trend continues and if history rhymes. 1. Middle East, SE Asia, and South America all have inflation above 50%. 2. Russia vs west. China vs. the US (Taiwan) Turkey vs. Iran (Syria, Armenia) Venezuela vs. itself
  - DIARRHEA_xd 4y ago
    > 1. Middle East, SE Asia, and South America all have inflation above 50%. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2022/06/15/in-the-u-s-and-around-the-world-inflation-is-high-and-getting-higher/ft_22-06-08_globalinflation_1/ https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2022/06/15/in-the-u-s-... This source is lacking, but the only countries above 50% inflation I can find are Turkey and Argentina. Could you point me in the direction of where you got your numbers?
    - DIARRHEA_xd 4y ago

lukas099 4y ago

What is the point here? It sounds like Wikipedia editors are doing their job of cooling off an edit war on a hot-button issue.

nsv 4y ago
To me, it's surprising that whether or not we're in a recession could be a hot button issue.
- SilasX 4y ago
  This. The stakes feel so low to me. Just about every president deals with a recession. Having a recession in your term is not a black mark of shame! If anything, I'd be more worried if a president didn't have any recession in their reign, as that would mean something else is being manipulated. The attempt to suddenly change it now feels quixotic.
- beeboop 4y ago
  Considering we're leading into elections, it's extremely hot button.

dubbel 4y ago

> The editor discredited rumors that Wikipedia had removed mention of two quarters of negative GDP growth from its recession definition and said any screenshots implying so are outdated. This article reports accurately (as far as I can tell) what different people are saying/tweeting about the issue, but stops short of confirming themselves whether or not the definitions were actually changed recently. Which is easily possible using the version history (maybe with a "according to the version history" disclaimer). Instead readers have to rely on the quote from the Wikipedia editor, which some people probably won't.

s1artibartfast 4y ago
Yeah, I found this very confusing. It didn't clarify what state it was locked at. Was it an older state, or a new one with several edits incorporated? This leaves people to make their own conclusions based on the priors.

mbg721 4y ago

'Recession' is much better defined than 'depression'; I don't think people use dictionary-definitions to define their economic state just because the TV told them to.

Ligma123 4y ago

Not sure if the article mentions it, but people changed the definition of the word "definition" to suit their agenda.

vfclists 4y ago

bradhe 4y ago

Love the dichotomy of the internet at play with this story. Over on r/conservative they're losing their minds over the fact that Wikipedia is changing the definition of "recession" on their site.

nailer 4y ago
How is that a dichotomy?
- bradhe 4y ago
  Wikipedia is the good guy on HN. Wikipedia is the bad guy on r/conservative. Where they fall is based on your world view.
  - nailer 4y ago
    I like Wikipedia as a project, but feel they're done a really poor job of telling people: > It looks like you're selecting something from Wikipedia! Remember, Wikipedia isn't a source - cite the source Wikipedia uses instead, and don't cite unsourced information at all!

jug 4y ago

It isn't blocked, just semi-protected so that you can't abuse the article with new accounts. (article title has this information but not the submission title) I'd like to add that this is a common move Wikipedia does for "hot" articles to alleviate some moderation pressure.

jesuslop 4y ago

Wikipedia should have a "controversial" warning for heavy editing

s1artibartfast 4y ago
It does have that functionality and you can see it on many other pages.

realityking 4y ago

Iu l

Kim_Bruning 4y ago

I'm not sure why this is news, really. Topics that are currently heavily debated/ in the news may lead to a low s/n ratio on wikipedia. Those topics temporarily can get locked; as one of a spectrum of measures that can be used to remedy these kinds of situation. It happens many times a day.

m0llusk 4y ago

It appears to be different this time. No, really. Recessions in general see GDP down and unemployment up. Right now GDP is down but employment is also down. This could potentially prevent or limit the impact of the recessionary cycle where layoffs reduce demand which brings down profits and GDP. Additionally, corporate profits and cash reserves are high while low labor force participation and problems hiring are making layoffs undesirable. While consumer confidence is down economic demand remains high at least for now. All this shows the current economic situation to be extremely unusual and quite apart from previous recessions whether it gets labeled as such or not.

simonh 4y ago
>Recessions in general see GDP down and unemployment up. Right now GDP is down but employment is also down... I think you mean unemployment is also down? Also work force participation is currently high, not low. But I get what you're saying, it's a very unusual situation. I think that's because this has nothing to do with the usual economic cycle. It's a very bouncy snap-back from the lockdown that's seen a boom in demand, a bust in supply, heavy stimulus. The feedback relationships between the economic indicators just aren't working as they usually do. Personally I think this recession will be relatively short. As I said it's overcorrections from the snap back after the pandemic, but things will settle down. That doesn't mean there won't be pain, there will, but hopefully it will be fairly short term.

mywittyname 4y ago

Check this out: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/GDP https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/GDP 1960Q2-1960Q3 - GDP grew, yet this is flagged as a recession. 1981Q3-1983Q1 - GPD grew consistently the entire time, yet this is one of the longer recessions on record. 1990Q3-1991Q2 - GDP only dropped for one quarter, then quickly rebounded, yet it is flagged as a long recession. 2020Q1-2020Q1 - This is flagged as recession, despite being less than a single quarter. By "two consecutive quarters definition, this recession started in 2019Q4 and lasted until 2021Q1. Yet the NBER doesn't flag it this way. If they were "playing politics," they would definitely have made this out to be a larger deal. It's pretty clear the NBER has never relied entirely on GDP data to determine recessions. Otherwise, there wouldn't be so many recessions with GDP growth.

gruez 4y ago
> Check this out: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/GDP https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/GDP Check this out: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/A939RX0Q048SBEA https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/A939RX0Q048SBEA (adjusted for inflation, adjusted for population).
- mywittyname 4y ago
  The argument is the definition is just GDP growth. Not inflation and per capital adjusted GDP growth. Hence, why I posted the chart I did. But even with that chart, none of the previous three recessions started with, 'two consecutive quarters of GDP decline.' They may have been preceded by it, but that does not mark the start of any of those recessions. By that definition, the great financial crisis started in 2007Q2, which would be well over a year before the collapse of AIG and Lehman. There's ample evidence on that chart that the NBER has remained consistent with their definitions over the year. Otherwise, the previous recession would have started at least a quarter earlier.
areyousure 4y ago
In case anyone was curious, here are the numbers from the provided link around a couple of the time periods indicated: > 1960Q2-1960Q3 - GDP grew, yet this is flagged as a recession. 1960-01-01: 542.648 1960-04-01: 541.08 1960-07-01: 545.604 1960-10-01: 540.197 1961-01-01: 545.018 > 2020Q1-2020Q1 - This is flagged as recession, despite being less than a single quarter. By "two consecutive quarters definition, this recession started in 2019Q4 and lasted until 2021Q1. 2019-10-01: 21694.458 2020-01-01: 21481.367 2020-04-01: 19477.444 2020-07-01: 21138.574 2020-10-01: 21477.597 2021-01-01: 22038.226

egberts1 4y ago

If you don’t like the most commonly used economic word, “change the goal post”.

bArray 4y ago

There's been a lot of redefinition recently. It's most definitely by design. The only thing to be argued is whether it is done so wrongfully or rightfully. The UK government for example recently price-capped certain products that are used to measure inflation. At least this redefinition in the US is more public. Ultimately, gate-keep the definition all you like. The cost of living has pushed the working class to the breaking point, it doesn't matter what you call that - the experience is most definitely real.

RickJWagner 4y ago

Last week I talked to an intern looking for a position and a programmer that had their job eliminated. That's two involuntary job hunters more than I've seen in a long time. I think a recession is here.