Comments on: Your Take: Are We Out Of The Recession?

By: Jody Cahall

Jody Cahall — Thu, 23 Sep 2010 00:17:16 +0000

The GDP is up only because Companies are laying off and consolidating. Who knows what coming out of washington, ive stopped investing in our country because I feel like im being punished for taking risk.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Mon, 20 Sep 2010 03:39:10 +0000

It took us years to get into a recession it will take us as many to get out. Scary but it’s reality.

By: Harry Taylor

Harry Taylor — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 14:24:41 +0000

NOT OVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

By: reinkefj

reinkefj — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 19:22:37 +0000

I’d point out that the weak dollar should influence our judgments. If the stock market goes up 50% but the dollar goes down 50% versus gold, the Euro, or some other “standard”, then did the market go up at all? Like fish in a tank, we can’t sense anything but water. Bad metaphor, can’t think of a good one. It’s like a football team gaining ground but the “year” gets redefined as the game proceeds. IT feels like we are losing ground on a “financial treadmill”. AND, give the gooferment’s tendency to make stuff up (i.e., jobs “saved” or “created”), especially if it’s a nebulously defined concept, I’m cynical about being “out of the recession”. The Titanic had its ice deliver but didn’t sink right away. Maybe we’re seeing the same thing. All that printing press money has to come home to roost.

By: centsandthecity

centsandthecity — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 14:47:57 +0000

Things seem to be looking up, but I think that a lot of people are still feeling very cautious.

By: lostAnnfound

lostAnnfound — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 20:30:51 +0000

“Technically–maybe? Emotionally–I think not yet”

I agree with Eric. On paper it may show that we are at the start of a recovery, but it doesn’t “feel” like it. I’m not ready to spend unless it is to buy something that we NEED, not necessarily want.

By: zapeta

zapeta — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 20:18:00 +0000

I don’t think most people perceive the recession to be over…weak consumer spending caused the stock market to lose 2.50% today. If people think the economy is weak they won’t be increasing their spending.

By: Wil

Wil — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 19:09:48 +0000

The “cash for clunkers” and other programs made the number look better than they actually were, in my opinion. However, perception is reality in economics…

By: Financial Samurai

Financial Samurai — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 19:04:15 +0000

I saw someone ordering a bottle of Crystal to celebrate yesterday night at a restaurant.

Definitely maybe!

By: Steven

Steven — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 17:23:06 +0000

The first step towards recovery is to increase the GDP, and that means people MUST spend. Someone HAS to do it. Someone must buy, otherwise goods/services are not sold.

It’s simple economics. When a business has high supply and low demand, they will lower prices to try to increase demand, but you can only lower prices so far to stay in business. At that point, businesses have to lower overhead to further reduce expenses, and that means layoffs/salary cuts.

As supply dwindles, the company will produce a little to replace SOME of the goods sold but not all with the skeleton crew left. If the company sees that demand grows above the supply, that is when they will hire people again to produce more goods to keep up with demand.

Essentially, the stimulus package is ther to stimulate demand. By artificially increasing demand to get people spending at a level where economic growth can be self-sustaining once again.

This is not to say you should go all out and go out on a shopping spree to “do your part”. You should never spend more than you make, EVER. But, this also means that you shouldn’t be hoarding money. By hoarding money, and not spending it, the economy is being artificially stagnated.

By: Jim

Jim — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 17:16:27 +0000

The recession is over.

By: Rick Morley

Rick Morley — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 17:07:18 +0000

To answer Jim’s question, I read that 1.7% of the 3.5% growth last quarter was from the auto industry — which was stimulated by the cash for clunkers program. My opinion is that nearly all of the growth we saw was stimulated by government programs.

Of course, there are those that would claim that this is just proof that these government programs were successful. Of course, they must have forgotten to check the current national debt.

By: Josiah Garber

Josiah Garber — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 16:44:49 +0000

Technically we could be out of it. But it is not an economic recovery. The way that GDP is calculated is rather ridiculous. I believe, the massive inflation of the monetary supply is what has caused our GDP to jump.

If you believe in Austrian Economics this will make things in the longer term much worse.

By: eric

eric — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 16:30:23 +0000

Technically–maybe? Emotionally–I think not yet. It’ll take awhile for people to become optimistic again.

By: Jim

Jim — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 16:21:31 +0000

Eric – You’re right about it not being clear, I edited the first paragraph to try to make it clearer.