List of recessions in the United States

Attempts have been made to date recessions in America beginning in 1790. These periods of recession were not identified until the 1920s. To construct the dates, researchers studied business annals during the period and constructed time series of the data. The earliest recessions for which there is the most certainty are those that coincide with major financial crises. Beginning in 1835, an index of business activity by the Cleveland Trust Company provides data for comparison between recessions. Beginning in 1854, the National Bureau of Economic Research dates recession peaks and troughs to the month. However, a standardized index does not exist for the earliest recessions. In 1791, Congress chartered the First Bank of the United States to handle the country's financial needs. The bank had some functions of a modern central bank, although it was responsible for only 20% of the young country's currency. In 1811 the bank's charter lapsed, but it was replaced by the Second Bank of the United States, which lasted from 1816 to 1836. ==Free Banking Era to the Great Depression (1836–1929)==

. Compared to today, the era from 1834 to the Great Depression was characterized by relatively severe and more frequent banking panics and recessions. In the 1830s, U.S. President Andrew Jackson fought to end the Second Bank of the United States. Following the Bank War, the Second Bank lost its charter in 1836. From 1837 to 1862, there was no national presence in banking, but still plenty of state and even local regulation, such as laws against branch banking which prevented diversification. In 1863, in response to financing pressures of the Civil War, Congress passed the National Banking Act, creating nationally chartered banks. Since there was neither a central bank nor deposit insurance during this era, banking panics were common. The dating of recessions during this period is controversial. Modern economic statistics, such as gross domestic product and unemployment, were not gathered during this period: Victor Zarnowitz evaluated a variety of indices to measure the severity of these recessions. From 1834 to 1929, one measure of recessions is the Cleveland Trust Company index, which measured business activity and, beginning in 1882, an index of trade and industrial activity was available, which can be used to compare recessions. ==Great Depression onward (1929–present)==

{{stack|, the post-World War II economy has seen long expansions and, for the most part, less severe recessions than in earlier American history. Following the end of World War II and the large adjustment as the economy adjusted from wartime to peacetime in 1945, the collection of many economic indicators, such as unemployment and GDP, became standardized. Recessions after World War II may be compared to each other much more easily than previous recessions because of these available data. The listed dates and durations are from the official chronology of the National Bureau of Economic Research. Until the start of the COVID-19 recession in 2020, no post-World War II era came anywhere near the depth of the Great Depression. In the Great Depression, GDP fell by 27% (the deepest after demobilization is the recession beginning in December 2007, during which GDP had fallen 5.1% by the second quarter of 2009) and the unemployment rate reached 24.9% (the highest since was the 10.8% rate reached during the 1981–1982 recession). Many factors that may have contributed to this moderation including the establishment of deposit insurance in the form of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation in 1933 and increased regulation of the banking sector. Other changes include the use of fiscal policy in the form of automatic stabilizers to alleviate cyclical volatility. The creation of the Federal Reserve System in 1913 has been disputed as a source of stability with it and its policies having mixed successes. Since the early 1980s the sources of the Great Moderation has been attributed to numerous causes including public policy, industry practices, technology, and even good luck. . (This notice stays below the table to be optimally visible to VisualEditor users.) --> == See also ==