The recession is over

NOT! A bunch of economists are even forecasting a double-dip with a second turndown sometime next spring. The numbers look right to me for that to happen. Now the 'big wigs' are weighing in -- from Emily Kaiser at Reuters:

Luminaries say recession not over
The private-sector National Bureau of Economic Research, considered the arbiter of recessions, announced on Monday it had pegged June 2009 as the end of the slump. That was no surprise to Wall Street economists, most of whom had long ago concluded the recession ended in the summer of last year.

But it put the Obama administration in an awkward position. How can policymakers declare the recession is over when nearly 15 million people are still out of work?

"I'm not an economist, and I'm not an academic," Geithner said on Wednesday when a Republican lawmaker tried to pin him down on whether he thought the recession was over. "And I would just say the following: This is still a very tough economy."

That answer didn't satisfy Representative Bill Posey, who at one point told Geithner to "man up" and give a clear yes or no answer.

Read on:

For Buffett, it's a matter of semantics rather than politics. The NBER considers a recession over when the economy gets back on the recovery path, while Buffett contends it isn't over until the damage is repaired.

"On any common sense definition, the average American is below where he was before, or his family, in terms of real income, GDP," Buffett said in a CNBC interview. "We're still in a recession. And we're not going to be out of it for a while, but we will get out of it."

And the sectors that are growing are not lifting up those sectors that are still falling. Housing. Automotive sales (the cash for clunkers really put the hurt on car sales). Construction. New business formation. All of these sectors are still in decline. Read Nouriel Roubini for more information about the double-dip heading our way...