# NBER Recession Dating The private, nonpartisan National Bureau of Economic Research convenes the Business Cycle Dating Committee — eight academic economists who decide, often a year after the fact, when US recessions officially began and ended. Their definition: a *significant decline in economic activity spread across the economy, lasting more than a few months* — judged across payrolls, real income, consumption, production, and GDP. There is no formula, by design. ## Latest reading *As of 2026-10-07 · refreshed monthly · the cross-indicator read lives at [[State of the US Economy]].* - **No recession has been dated since 2020.** The committee's most recent announcement (**July 19, 2021**) dated the trough to **April 2020**. The latest peak is still **February 2020**. - The committee has eight members and has been chaired by Valerie Ramey (Stanford) since 2024. - Announcement lags have ranged from **4 months** (the February 2020 peak, announced June 8, 2020) to **21 months** (the March 1991 trough, announced December 1992). So "is this a recession?" arguments in real time will always outrun the official call. See [[Recession]]. *Sources:* [NBER committee announcements](https://www.nber.org/research/business-cycle-dating/business-cycle-dating-committee-announcements) · [NBER expansions and contractions](https://www.nber.org/research/data/us-business-cycle-expansions-and-contractions) · [NBER dating FAQ](https://www.nber.org/business-cycle-dating-procedure-frequently-asked-questions) · [NBER committee members](https://www.nber.org/research/business-cycle-dating/business-cycle-dating-committee-members) ## The "two quarters" fight (2022) The folk definition — two consecutive quarters of negative GDP — is not and has never been the official US standard, but in mid-2022 it became a partisan litmus test. Q1 and Q2 2022 GDP both printed negative (later revised) while payrolls grew at a boom pace; opposition messaging declared the "Biden recession" already here by definition, while the administration was accused of "redefining recession" for noting NBER's actual longstanding role. Wikipedia locked its recession article over edit wars. No recession was ever dated. The episode is the purest *definition-level* indicator fight on record — not about what the numbers were, but about who gets to say what the numbers mean. The structural feature that invites abuse: because NBER rules retroactively, there is always a months-long window in which "we're in a recession right now" is unfalsifiable — free real estate for whichever side benefits from doom. ## See Also - [[GDP]] — the folk-definition input - [[Sahm Rule]] — the real-time trigger that tries to beat the committee - [[Indicator Cherry-Picking]] — definition fights as a technique