Friday, April 3, 2009

Length of US Recessions


While the stock market has rallied nicely since bottoming on March 9th, the economy continues to struggle. For some perspective on the current economic recession, today's chart illustrates the duration of all US recessions since 1900. As today's chart illustrates, the five longest recessions all began prior to 1930. The length of the current recession (now entering its 16th month) is above average and equal to the longest recessions (1973 & 1981) since the Great Depression.