Great Recession

“Great Recession” is a variant of the 1930s name “Great Depression.” Many writers have called economic dips a “Great Recession,” starting about 1974 and continuing in the down years in the 1980s and 1990s.
 
In December 2008, the U.S. government officially declared that the country had been in a recession since 2007. Several writers used “Great Recession” following that December 2008 National Bureau of Economic Research report. In March 2009, IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn also used the name “Great Recession.” The New York (NY) Times published an article, “Great Recession’: A Brief Etymology,” on March 11, 2009.
 
The term “Greatest Depression” has also been popularly used since 2008. A recession after the 2008 “Great Recession” has been called the “Greater Recession.”
 
   
OCLC WorldCat record
The Great Recession in the writing of California history : typescript, 1963.
by John Walton Caughey
Type:  Book : Manuscript Archival Material; English
Summary/Abstract
Address at the 1963 meeting of the Friends of the Bancroft Library, mainly regarding California historians from 1890 to 1915.
 
14 November 1974, Dallas (TX) Morning News, “Numbers Game” by Sam Blair, section B, pg. 1:
You’ve heard about ‘29, the year the Great Depression began. Now we’re in ‘74, the year known for the Great Recession.
 
Google News Archive
30 November 1974, St. Petersburg (FL) Times, “If money’s tight, nobody told buyers” by Kathryn Harris, Pinellas Times, pg. 1, col. 1:
CLEARWATER—It may be the year of the Great Recession, but few people were boycotting Clearwater Mall or other shopping centers Friday.
   
Google News Archive
10 August 1975, St. Petersburg (FL) Times, pg. 9G, col. 1:
“Great Recession” doesn’t
halt American vacations
By SETH S. KING
   
OCLC WorldCat record
The great recession, with a postscript on stagflation
by Otto Eckstein
Type:  Book; English
Publisher: Amsterdam ; New York : North-Holland Pub. Co. ; New York : Distributors for the U.S. and Canada, Elsevier/North Holland, 1978.
 
Google News Archive
26 May 1982, North Island Gazette (Port Hardy, B.C.), pg. 4, col. 1:
The blessings of the Great Recession
By Peter Paterson
     
The Onion
How We Made It Through The Great Recession
By James Waltrip
Investment Banker, Tanner & Reamish
September 25, 1996 | Issue 30•07
The year was 1987, a time I’ll never forget. The country was in the grips of the Great Recession, the worst economic crisis my generation had ever known. In October of that year, the bottom fell out of the market, tumbling a record 508 points in a single day. Back then I was green as hell, working with discretionary accounts at Tanner & Reamish with little more to show for myself than an office overlooking Wall Street and a few hundred thou in convertible securities. But I found out real quick what life was like back in ‘87.
 
OCLC WorldCat
The Great Recession: Lessons for Macroeconomic Policy from Japan
by Kenneth Kuttner; Adam Posen
Type:  Article; English
Publisher: Brookings Institution Press
Publication: Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, 2001, no. 2 (2002): 93-186
   
OCLC WorldCat
Our Great Recession Obsession
by Robert J Samuelson
Type:  Article; English
Publisher: New York, etc., Newsweek, etc.]
Publication: Newsweek. (November 12, 2007): 66
       
Portfolio.com (April 14, 2008)
Wall Street
It’s (Really) the Economy, Stupid
by Jesse Eisinger
(...)
The next president will take office during what may well come to be known as the Great Recession, the worst financial crisis of the post-World War II era, worse than the savings-and-loan mess and worse than the stagflation of the 1970s.
(...)
A great recession—and a New New Deal?
 
Bloomberg.com
U.S. May Be in for ‘Great Recession,’ Longest Postwar
By Steve Matthews and Timothy R. Homan
Dec. 2, 2008 (Bloomberg)—The U.S. economy, now officially in recession, may be in the midst of the longest slump in the post- World War II era as job losses mount and credit dries up.
 
The economic slump began in December 2007 when payrolls reached a peak, the business cycle dating committee of the National Bureau of Economic Research, a private, nonprofit group of economists based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, said yesterday. The last time the U.S. was in a recession was from March through November 2001, according to NBER.
 
New York (NY) Times
No Question We’re in a Financial Pickle. What Do We Call It?
By BRIAN STELTER
Published: December 11, 2008
The economy is formally in a recession, as the National Bureau of Economic Research and President Bush said last week. But the current crisis lacks a capital-letter name.
 
Then again, the Great Depression did not become “great” immediately, and World War I wasn’t known as No. 1 at the time. While the “economic crisis” — a term often used by journalists — has also been called the “credit crunch” and the “Wall Street crisis,” it remains the rare major news event without a defining logo, one that crystallizes attention and acts as shorthand for reporters.
(...)
CNBC, which has seen sharp ratings gains in recent months, initially called the economic situation a “credit crisis.” Eventually it became a “Wall Street crisis,” and before long it was a “Wall Street/Main Street crisis.” In the last week, “Great Recession” has become a popular phrase. 
 
U.S. News & World Report
Thriving During the Great Recession
How to save more, spend less, and still enjoy life’s luxuries
By Kimberly Palmer
Posted February 6, 2009
No surprise here: Recessions are no fun. While the current downturn has spurred some welcome developments—it has, after all, made frugality kind of cool again—it’s also forced many people to put their hopes and dreams on hold. When your savings lose value and you’re worried about keeping your job, it’s harder to proceed with plans to return to school, have kids, get married, or buy that dream house.
   
New York (NY) Times
Op-Ed Contributor
Our Great Recession
By NIALL FERGUSON
Published: February 28, 2009
THIS recession, which began in December 2007, has already lasted longer than the average postwar recession. If it turns out to be as bad as the most protracted of the postwar downturns, we will touch bottom next month.
 
But my strong suspicion is that we are now in something more like a Great Recession. It won’t produce as steep a fall in American output as the Depression did, but it may prove to be as prolonged.
(...)
Niall Ferguson is a professor at Harvard and the author of “The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World.”
   
Reuters
IMF warns of global “Great Recession”
Tue Mar 10, 2009 11:53am EDT
By Lesley Wroughton and George Obulutsa
DAR ES SALAAM (Reuters) - The International Monetary Fund warned on Tuesday that the world economy will likely contract this year in a “Great Recession” and African leaders said the financial crisis could undo hard-won social-economic gains.
 
“The IMF expects global growth to slow below zero this year, the worst performance in most of our lifetimes,” IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn told African political and financial leaders in the Tanzanian capital.
 
24/7 Wall Street
“The Great Recession”: The Art Of Naming Things Before They Happen
Posted: March 10, 2009 at 4:47 am
The head of the IMF is calling the period that the world is in now and is likely to stay in for some time “The Great Recession”. According to Reuters, he said “The IMF expects global growth to slow below zero this year, the worst performance in most of our lifetimes.”
 
That assessment may be correct, but there are a number of factors that could make it wrong.
(...)
Giving this economic period a name, which is almost certainly premature, is not going to affect the outcome. It is really only useful to get press.
 
Douglas A. McIntyre
   
New York (NY) Times
March 11, 2009, 5:39 pm
‘Great Recession’: A Brief Etymology
By Catherine Rampell
The “Great Recession” has taken hold.
 
As a term, that is.
 
The title “Great Recession” seems to be gaining some currency. After months of floundering over what pithy moniker to call this mess we’re in, a number of analysts, economists, historians, reporters, columnists, critics and even International Monetary Fund officials have begun using the term, often with a qualifier like, “what some are calling ‘The Great Recession.’”

Clark Hoyt, the Times’s public editor, asked me on Tuesday who had coined the phrase, and when. I wasn’t sure, so I did some archive searches.

Brian Stelter, a colleague who covers the media, wrote back in December that “In the last week, ‘Great Recession’ has become a popular phrase.”