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You say tomato, I say recession
Members of the House Financial Services Committee on Wednesday tried to get the witness on the hot seat — Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke — to admit the country is in a recession.
Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, was among those refusing to accept the official definition of a recession, which is two consecutive quarters of shrinking economic output. So far, government statistics show the economy is still growing, though at a slow pace. “Our government tells us, ‘Well, there is no recession, so things must be all right,’ ” Paul said. Despite such assurances, “a lot of people are very angry,” he said.
Rep. Joe Baca, D-Calif., pushed Bernanke: “Do you believe that we are in a recession?”
Bernanke replied, “I don’t know.” He said that calling a recession is a “technical” matter for economists. But he was willing to admit that no matter what the statistics show, “this is clearly a rough time.”
So he did use an R word to describe the economy.
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