https://nypost.com/2022/07/29/elon-musk-blasts-wikipedia-after-it-suspends-edits-of-recession-page/
I think we have a cult here.. meets all the criteria laid out in a former post..
15 replies (most recent on top)
Every Economics textbook in the world has defined recession as 2 contiguous quarters of negative growth. Yes we are in a recession.
It's not the end of the story. Recessions aren't officially declared for months after the actual recession took place, we do not know if we are in a recession until NBER declares it. That's been the standard for a century now.
The media and whomever else can call it a recession, but that doesn't make it official. It takes more than 2 quarters of GDP decline to call a recession otherwise NBER wouldn't exist. Those are just facts, no feels involved.
Actually they do pick and choose. How the unemployment rate is calculated has been changed several times over the years, often for political/spin reasons. Even if 100% of people have jobs, if GDP is shrinking for 2+ Qs we are in a recession. End of story. It's not about feels or main street vs wall street or anything else, it's basic math and terminology. Is the sum total of our economic production growing or shrinking? Pretty straightforward. If it's shrinking in spite of a lower unemployment rate, that's actually bad news because more people are producing less. Efficiency is going in the toilet.
2 successive quarters of decline in GDP. Yes, we are in a recession.
Also consumer debt is rising as a result of the average household falling behind.
Right, the point is that the unemployment rate is not a great argument against a recession. GDP and production are declining. Wages are not keeping pace with price increases.
We use the unemployment rate because we cannot pick and choose when we decide to use a different rate (ie what party is current in the white house to skew the numbers in the opposing party's favor). There's still 3 job openings for every candidate.
The labor participation rate includes a large number of retired individuals, by definition it's everyone 15 years and older, a lot of baby boomers are exiting the work force and retiring, they are still included in those numbers.
@2fav. That has been the case long before COVID when that has happened to other folks going back to the Bush H1B explosion in the early 2000s
Unemployment is a flawed indicator. Labor force participation rate is still down in comparison to pre-Covid. Also, the unemployment rate does not take into account underemployment. For example, someone who lost their business as a result of the response to Covid who now works at Target to make ends meet.
@xhp. QAnon guy doesn’t mention Wall Street was artificially inflated for four years to hide the pain on Main Street that everyone knew but certain media talking heads.
Main Street has been in a recession for years as the wage gap widened since the 80s. The tax cut ponzi scheme even made it worse.
@kku+1hY4fE
Who says, specifically? Anyone for whom it's not entirely self serving? Unemployment may be a trailing indicator in this particular recession. Many companies, even highly profitable ones, are freezing hiring. That's the first step to staffing reductions, via attrition if nothing else.
2 quarters of negative growth is the unofficial definition of a recession... But you cannot have a recession if the labor market is as tight as it currently is. You need much higher levels of unemployment to qualify as an official recession, it's highly unlikely we'll see even 4% unemployment this year.
We're in for some very odd years over the next decade at least. A lot of boomers retired and Gen Y hasn't fully graduated college to replace them.
Two consecutive quarters of negative growth is a recession and always has been. In breaking news, politicians are self serving liars.
"Believe what the goverment tells you and not what you see with your eyes"
If it is a Murdoch paper, you can count on it!