#Manfred keil full

California has the fourth highest unemployment rate along with Massachusetts and Rhode Island. The “sickest” parts of the nation experienced unemployment rates of over 20% (Nevada, Michigan, Hawaii).

have not been this high since the Great Depression of 1929/1930.įor California and the Inland Empire, the April and May unemployment rates were the highest on record since state and regional data were published. Although the national unemployment rate improved from 14.7% in April to 13.3% in May, it may remain elevated for some time before dropping to single digits. Data for the nation that was released earlier this month show that the unemployment rate stabilized in record-high territory and the worst part seems to be over. Next, the headline-making unemployment rate. The impact of the shutdown on second quarter GDP will be even more devastating when it is released at the end of July. Her forecast for the recovery is that it will not be rapid but rather long and drawn out, more like a “Nike-Swoosh.”Ī more careful look alarmingly shows that the damage almost entirely occurred in the last two weeks of the quarter, when stay-at-home orders were issued across large parts of the country.įor GDP growth to collapse at this rate for the last two weeks if GDP had grown at the same 2% steady rate as it did during the fourth quarter of 2019, the decline was breathtaking.

In addition, she prescribes quantitative easing, which the patient had taken 10½ years ago for the first time. She orders an extra strong dose of fiscal policy ($3 trillion) and includes treatment that was tried successfully by doctors in some foreign countries (Paycheck Protection Program). The doctor declares that you are officially very ill (the National Bureau of Economic Research has dated the beginning of the recession to March 2020). By April, the patient’s conditions deteriorated rapidly, with GDP falling by an annualized rate of 5% and the unemployment rate hitting record high levels. Indeed, those were the readings in February 2020.

#Manfred keil full

A healthy economy has a normal heart rate (GDP growing at about 2% annually), a good pulse (unemployment rate approximately equivalent to full employment), and normal blood pressure (low stable inflation). economy was a patient who felt ill.Ī visit to the doctor results in a diagnosis and possibly a prescription of medicine (fiscal and monetary policy).