IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/tpr/restat/v104y2022i2p246-258.html

Why Has the U.S. Economy Stagnated since the Great Recession?

Author

Listed:
  • Yunjong Eo

    (Korea University)

  • James Morley

    (University of Sydney)

Abstract

Since the Great Recession in 2007-2009, U.S. real GDP has failed to return to its previously projected path, a phenomenon widely associated with secular stagnation. We investigate whether this stagnation was due to hysteresis effects from the Great Recession, a persistent negative output gap following the recession, or slower trend growth for other reasons. To do so, we develop a new Markov-switching time series model of output growth that accommodates two different types of recessions: those that permanently alter the level of real GDP and those with only temporary effects. We also account for structural change in trend growth. Estimates from our model suggest that the Great Recession generated a large, persistent negative output gap rather than any substantial hysteresis effects, with the economy eventually recovering to a lower trend path that appears to be due to a reduction in productivity growth that began prior to the onset of the Great Recession.

Suggested Citation

  • Yunjong Eo & James Morley, 2022. "Why Has the U.S. Economy Stagnated since the Great Recession?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 104(2), pages 246-258, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:tpr:restat:v:104:y:2022:i:2:p:246-258
    DOI: 10.1162/rest_a_00957
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://doi.org/10.1162/rest_a_00957
    Download Restriction: Access to PDF is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1162/rest_a_00957?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or

    for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. John Fernald & Robert Inklaar & Dimitrije Ruzic, 2025. "The Productivity Slowdown in Advanced Economies: Common Shocks or Common Trends?," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 71(1), February.
    2. Alexander Beames & Mariano Kulish & Nadine Yamout, 2022. "Fiscal Policy and the Slowdown in Trend Growth in an Open Economy," Working Papers 143, Red Nacional de Investigadores en Economía (RedNIE).
    3. Berger, Tino & Richter, Julia & Wong, Benjamin, 2022. "A unified approach for jointly estimating the business and financial cycle, and the role of financial factors," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 136(C).
    4. Francesco Furlanetto & Antoine Lepetit & Ørjan Robstad & Juan Rubio-Ramírez & Pål Ulvedal, 2025. "Estimating Hysteresis Effects," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 17(1), pages 35-70, January.
    5. Baquedano, Felix & Zereyesus, Yacob Abrehe & Christensen, Cheryl & Valdes, Constanza, "undated". "COVID-19 Working Paper: International Food Security Assessment, 2020-2030: COVID-19 Update and Impacts of Food Insecurity," Administrative Publications 309399, United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service.
    6. Hie Joo Ahn & Yunjong Eo, 2025. "Hysteresis and the Role of Downward Nominal Wage Rigidity: Evidence from U.S. States," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2025-062r1, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.), revised 16 Dec 2025.
    7. Kulish, Mariano & Yamout, Nadine, 2024. "The fiscal arithmetic of a slowdown in trend growth," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 168(C).
    8. Donayre, Luiggi, 2022. "On the behavior of Okun's law across business cycles," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 112(C).
    9. van Os, Bram & van Dijk, Dick, 2024. "Accelerating peak dating in a dynamic factor Markov-switching model," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 40(1), pages 313-323.
    10. Callum J. Jones & Mariano Kulish & James Morley, 2021. "A Structural Measure of the Shadow Federal Funds Rate," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2021-064, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    11. Eo, Yunjong & Morley, James, 2023. "Does the Survey of Professional Forecasters help predict the shape of recessions in real time?," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 233(C).
    12. Fernando Delbianco & Andrés Fioriti & Fernando Tohmé, 2023. "Markov chains, eigenvalues and the stability of economic growth processes," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 64(3), pages 1347-1373, March.
    13. Donayre, Luiggi & Panovska, Irina, 2021. "Recession-specific recoveries: L’s, U’s and everything in between," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 209(C).
    14. Nicolo Maffei-Faccioli, 2020. "Identifying the Sources of the Slowdown in Growth: Demand vs. Supply," 2020 Papers pma2978, Job Market Papers.
    15. Sui Luo & Yu‐Fan Huang & Richard Startz, 2021. "Are Recoveries all the Same: GDP and TFP?," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 83(5), pages 1111-1129, October.
    16. Nicolò Maffei‐Faccioli, 2025. "Identifying the Sources of the Slowdown in Growth: Demand Versus Supply," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 40(2), pages 181-194, March.
    17. Fatás, Antonio & Singh, Sanjay R., 2024. "Supply or demand? Policy makers’ confusion in the presence of hysteresis," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 161(C).
    18. Francesco Furlanetto & Kåre Hagelund & Frank Hansen & Ørjan Robstad, 2023. "Norges Bank Output Gap Estimates: Forecasting Properties, Reliability, Cyclical Sensitivity and Hysteresis," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 85(1), pages 238-267, February.
    19. Bruno Feunou & Jean-Sébastien Fontaine, 2021. "Debt-Secular Economic Changes and Bond Yields," Staff Working Papers 21-14, Bank of Canada.
    20. Adam Check & Jeremy Piger, 2021. "Structural Breaks in U.S. Macroeconomic Time Series: A Bayesian Model Averaging Approach," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 53(8), pages 1999-2036, December.
    21. James Morley, 2019. "The business cycle: periodic pandemic or rollercoaster ride?," International Journal of Economic Policy Studies, Springer, vol. 13(2), pages 425-431, August.
    22. Li, Mengheng & Mendieta-Muñoz, Ivan, 2024. "Dynamic hysteresis effects," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 163(C).
    23. Any Flore Djoumessi Djoukouo, 2023. "Recessions and recoveries in Central African countries: Lessons from the past," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 35(6), pages 1121-1142, August.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • C22 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Single Equation Models; Single Variables - - - Time-Series Models; Dynamic Quantile Regressions; Dynamic Treatment Effect Models; Diffusion Processes
    • C51 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric Modeling - - - Model Construction and Estimation
    • E32 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Business Fluctuations; Cycles
    • E37 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Forecasting and Simulation: Models and Applications

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:tpr:restat:v:104:y:2022:i:2:p:246-258. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: The MIT Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://direct.mit.edu/journals .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.