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Is the U.S. Recession Over Yet?

March 20, 2002

Marcelle Chauvet

Economics Professor

University of California Riverside

and

Research Director

Center for Research on Economic and Financial Cycles

Recent data indicate that the U.S. economy is already showing signs of breaking out of the 2001 recession. The NBER has announced in February 2002 that “the Committee will wait until a substantial period of expansion has elapsed before declaring that a turning point in the economy is a true trough, marking the end of a recession.” Thus, the NBER dating procedure can not be used in real time.

· How can we assess whether a recession is over until the NBER announces its decision?

· Are there models that can date business cycles in real time?

The CREFC Economic Letter 2002-03-20 offers some answers to these questions. In particular, it uses Markov switching models to date business cycles in real time:

20/03/2002 — Is the U.S. Recession Over Yet? (full text)