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I don't mind changing a definition for a better one. But the WH did not do this. They just unilaterally claimed that "this two quarters of negative growth is no

I don't mind changing a definition for a better one. But the WH did not do this. They just unilaterally claimed that "this two quarters of negative growth is not the definition" to shut all other questions about the economy slowing down.

zmgsabst 4y ago
Their strategy worked for COVID[1], why wouldn’t they keep doing it? [1] — denying inconvenient facts, redefining terms, and using social media to censor/propagandize. Now Facebook is “fact checking” economists. https://www.foxnews.com/media/economist-slams-facebook-absolutely-orwellian-fact-check-upholding-bidens-recession-denial https://www.foxnews.com/media/economist-slams-facebook-absol...
scrlk 4y ago
>"In the end, the Party would announce that two and two made five, and you would have to believe it. It was inevitable that they should make that claim sooner or later: the logic of their position demanded it. Not merely the validity of experience, but the very existence of external reality, was tacitly denied by their philosophy. The heresy of heresies was common sense. And what was terrifying was not that they would kill you for thinking otherwise, but that they might be right. For, after all, how do we know that two and two make four? Or that the force of gravity works? Or that the past is unchangeable? If both the past and the external world exist only in the mind, and if the mind itself is controllable—what then?" - Nineteen Eighty-Four
generj 4y ago
Except that’s never been the definition. For decades the definition has always been “whatever NBER says.” Two quarters of negative growth is a convenient shorthand because NBER takes their time declaring a recession, and it is generally true Several recent recessions don’t match the two quarters of negative growth rule.
- TeeMassive 4y ago
  > Except that’s never been the definition. That's not true. Economists have given definitions and the one considered the de facto standard was two quarters of negative growth, which was a very good predictor of recessions in our lifetime: https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/knowledge/economics/recession/ https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/knowledge/ec... > Recession is a term used to signify a slowdown in general economic activity. In macroeconomics, recessions are officially recognized after two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth rates. In the U.S., they are declared by a committee of experts at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER). https://www.forbes.com/advisor/investing/what-is-a-recession/ https://www.forbes.com/advisor/investing/what-is-a-recession... > In 1974, economist Julius Shiskin came up with a few rules of thumb to define a recession: The most popular was two consecutive quarters of declining GDP. A healthy economy expands over time, so two quarters in a row of contracting output suggests there are serious underlying problems, according to Shiskin. This definition of a recession became a common standard over the years. > For decades the definition has always been “whatever NBER says.” They actually have their own definition, but it's more lose and more inclusive: https://www.forbes.com/advisor/investing/what-is-a-recession/ https://www.forbes.com/advisor/investing/what-is-a-recession... > NBER has its own definition of what constitutes a recession, namely “a significant decline in 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.” And from the NBER itself: https://www.nber.org/business-cycle-dating-procedure-frequently-asked-questions https://www.nber.org/business-cycle-dating-procedure-frequen... > Most of the recessions identified by our procedures do consist of two or more consecutive quarters of declining real GDP, but not all of them. In 2001, for example, the recession did not include two consecutive quarters of decline in real GDP. In the recession from the peak in December 2007 to the trough in June 2009, real GDP declined in the first, third, and fourth quarters of 2008 and in the first and second quarters of 2009. Real GDI declined for the final three quarters of 2001 and for five of the six quarters in the 2007–2009 recession. This is where the WH's manipulation comes in. They say it's not the actual definition, but what they don't say is that the other definitions are more likely to identify 2022 as the beginning of a recession. > Several recent recessions don’t match the two quarters of negative growth rule. How many times there was two or more quarters of negative growth that wasn't a recession?
- zaroth 4y ago
  My googling seems to indicate; > All of the past 12 recessions identified by the National Bureau of Economic Research have seen at least two quarters of negative GDP growth, and, conversely, each instance of at least two quarters of negative GDP growth has later been declared a recession. Is this untrue? Perhaps, because some other sites list 14 recessions not 12… Then there’s also this; > Over the past 75 years, there’s been a U.S. recession every time real GDP has fallen for two consecutive quarters (in Q2 1947 and Q3 1947, real GDP did decline without a recession). > Over those 75 years there have also been two recessions without back-to-back declines in real GDP, namely the 1960-61 and 2001 recessions.
  - generj 4y ago
    Right it’s a pretty good shortcut / shorthand for recessions, but no substitute for experts making a judgment call on multiple factors. The 2020 recession declared at the start of the COVID pandemic didn’t even last one quarter. Per your source, 2001 wasn’t consecutive quarterly drops in GDP but NBER prefers monthly stats over quarterly anyways. This means of the four recessions in my lifetime (1990,2001,2007) 2 out of 4 (2021 and 2001) don’t align with the shorthand of two quarters of consecutive negative growth.
  - generj 4y ago
    Perhaps, because some other sites list 14 recessions not 12… It really really depends on when you start counting. https://www.nber.org/research/data/us-business-cycle-expansions-and-contractions https://www.nber.org/research/data/us-business-cycle-expansi... NBER has actually determined 35 recessions, most of them retroactively (as far back as they had reasonable data into 1854). They started the current committee in 1978, so it has only been around for six “business cycle contractions.” NBER has existed since 1920, but didn’t start doing business cycle work until 1929 (pretty easy to call that one as a recession). That’s 15 recessions, perhaps the source claiming 14 was during/before the Feb 2020 recession?
SantalBlush 4y ago
Because it's not the definition. In university long ago, we were told that 2 quarters of decreased growth was not a sufficient criterion for recession in the US. So when I keep seeing people complain about Biden's administration "changing the definition", I can conclude that they either have no clue what they're talking about, or they're just lying. In most cases, it's probably the former. The definition of recession that invloves more than two quarters of reduced growth has been around for a long time. The idea that it hasn't is what was really made up for political purposes.
randomopining 4y ago
It's not the definition. If you have 2 quarters of negative growth, but everything else is good... what's the point of even calling it a recession? It loses it's value as a word. 2008 was clearly a recession, people felt it. Everybody seems to be doing fine right now as a collective. Very few people have lost jobs so far, as seen in the unemployment numbers. Just some overpaid tech
- AnimalMuppet 4y ago
  If you have 2 quarters of negative growth, that means that the economy is producing less stuff for at least 6 months, and increasingly less. That means that there's less for people to buy/consume/use. That's likely to mean that "everything else is not good".
  - ModernMech 4y ago
    I notice you use the qualify your statement with "likely". Does that mean you agree things could still be good in some circumstance?
    - AnimalMuppet 4y ago
      Well, maybe, but I don't see how. I mean, people could be happier or something, but recession is an economic thing rather than a psychological one. If there's less stuff, then I don't see how there isn't "other things that are less good". Employment, inflation (people bidding for less stuff with the same amount of money), shortages... it's got to show up somewhere... doesn't it?

zmgsabst 4y ago

Their strategy worked for COVID[1], why wouldn’t they keep doing it? [1] — denying inconvenient facts, redefining terms, and using social media to censor/propagandize. Now Facebook is “fact checking” economists. https://www.foxnews.com/media/economist-slams-facebook-absolutely-orwellian-fact-check-upholding-bidens-recession-denial https://www.foxnews.com/media/economist-slams-facebook-absol...

scrlk 4y ago

>"In the end, the Party would announce that two and two made five, and you would have to believe it. It was inevitable that they should make that claim sooner or later: the logic of their position demanded it. Not merely the validity of experience, but the very existence of external reality, was tacitly denied by their philosophy. The heresy of heresies was common sense. And what was terrifying was not that they would kill you for thinking otherwise, but that they might be right. For, after all, how do we know that two and two make four? Or that the force of gravity works? Or that the past is unchangeable? If both the past and the external world exist only in the mind, and if the mind itself is controllable—what then?" - Nineteen Eighty-Four

generj 4y ago

Except that’s never been the definition. For decades the definition has always been “whatever NBER says.” Two quarters of negative growth is a convenient shorthand because NBER takes their time declaring a recession, and it is generally true Several recent recessions don’t match the two quarters of negative growth rule.

TeeMassive 4y ago
> Except that’s never been the definition. That's not true. Economists have given definitions and the one considered the de facto standard was two quarters of negative growth, which was a very good predictor of recessions in our lifetime: https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/knowledge/economics/recession/ https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/knowledge/ec... > Recession is a term used to signify a slowdown in general economic activity. In macroeconomics, recessions are officially recognized after two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth rates. In the U.S., they are declared by a committee of experts at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER). https://www.forbes.com/advisor/investing/what-is-a-recession/ https://www.forbes.com/advisor/investing/what-is-a-recession... > In 1974, economist Julius Shiskin came up with a few rules of thumb to define a recession: The most popular was two consecutive quarters of declining GDP. A healthy economy expands over time, so two quarters in a row of contracting output suggests there are serious underlying problems, according to Shiskin. This definition of a recession became a common standard over the years. > For decades the definition has always been “whatever NBER says.” They actually have their own definition, but it's more lose and more inclusive: https://www.forbes.com/advisor/investing/what-is-a-recession/ https://www.forbes.com/advisor/investing/what-is-a-recession... > NBER has its own definition of what constitutes a recession, namely “a significant decline in 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.” And from the NBER itself: https://www.nber.org/business-cycle-dating-procedure-frequently-asked-questions https://www.nber.org/business-cycle-dating-procedure-frequen... > Most of the recessions identified by our procedures do consist of two or more consecutive quarters of declining real GDP, but not all of them. In 2001, for example, the recession did not include two consecutive quarters of decline in real GDP. In the recession from the peak in December 2007 to the trough in June 2009, real GDP declined in the first, third, and fourth quarters of 2008 and in the first and second quarters of 2009. Real GDI declined for the final three quarters of 2001 and for five of the six quarters in the 2007–2009 recession. This is where the WH's manipulation comes in. They say it's not the actual definition, but what they don't say is that the other definitions are more likely to identify 2022 as the beginning of a recession. > Several recent recessions don’t match the two quarters of negative growth rule. How many times there was two or more quarters of negative growth that wasn't a recession?
zaroth 4y ago
My googling seems to indicate; > All of the past 12 recessions identified by the National Bureau of Economic Research have seen at least two quarters of negative GDP growth, and, conversely, each instance of at least two quarters of negative GDP growth has later been declared a recession. Is this untrue? Perhaps, because some other sites list 14 recessions not 12… Then there’s also this; > Over the past 75 years, there’s been a U.S. recession every time real GDP has fallen for two consecutive quarters (in Q2 1947 and Q3 1947, real GDP did decline without a recession). > Over those 75 years there have also been two recessions without back-to-back declines in real GDP, namely the 1960-61 and 2001 recessions.
- generj 4y ago
  Right it’s a pretty good shortcut / shorthand for recessions, but no substitute for experts making a judgment call on multiple factors. The 2020 recession declared at the start of the COVID pandemic didn’t even last one quarter. Per your source, 2001 wasn’t consecutive quarterly drops in GDP but NBER prefers monthly stats over quarterly anyways. This means of the four recessions in my lifetime (1990,2001,2007) 2 out of 4 (2021 and 2001) don’t align with the shorthand of two quarters of consecutive negative growth.
- generj 4y ago
  Perhaps, because some other sites list 14 recessions not 12… It really really depends on when you start counting. https://www.nber.org/research/data/us-business-cycle-expansions-and-contractions https://www.nber.org/research/data/us-business-cycle-expansi... NBER has actually determined 35 recessions, most of them retroactively (as far back as they had reasonable data into 1854). They started the current committee in 1978, so it has only been around for six “business cycle contractions.” NBER has existed since 1920, but didn’t start doing business cycle work until 1929 (pretty easy to call that one as a recession). That’s 15 recessions, perhaps the source claiming 14 was during/before the Feb 2020 recession?

SantalBlush 4y ago

Because it's not the definition. In university long ago, we were told that 2 quarters of decreased growth was not a sufficient criterion for recession in the US. So when I keep seeing people complain about Biden's administration "changing the definition", I can conclude that they either have no clue what they're talking about, or they're just lying. In most cases, it's probably the former. The definition of recession that invloves more than two quarters of reduced growth has been around for a long time. The idea that it hasn't is what was really made up for political purposes.

randomopining 4y ago

It's not the definition. If you have 2 quarters of negative growth, but everything else is good... what's the point of even calling it a recession? It loses it's value as a word. 2008 was clearly a recession, people felt it. Everybody seems to be doing fine right now as a collective. Very few people have lost jobs so far, as seen in the unemployment numbers. Just some overpaid tech

AnimalMuppet 4y ago
If you have 2 quarters of negative growth, that means that the economy is producing less stuff for at least 6 months, and increasingly less. That means that there's less for people to buy/consume/use. That's likely to mean that "everything else is not good".
- ModernMech 4y ago
  I notice you use the qualify your statement with "likely". Does that mean you agree things could still be good in some circumstance?
  - AnimalMuppet 4y ago
    Well, maybe, but I don't see how. I mean, people could be happier or something, but recession is an economic thing rather than a psychological one. If there's less stuff, then I don't see how there isn't "other things that are less good". Employment, inflation (people bidding for less stuff with the same amount of money), shortages... it's got to show up somewhere... doesn't it?