AP: The Great Recession: The numbers tell the story (still 10% unemployed)

[Omaha Steve]

http://apnews.excite.com/article/20091010/D9B8C8E00.html

Oct 10, 1:28 PM (ET)

By TIM PARADIS

NEW YORK (AP) - A year ago this weekend, the Dow Jones industrial average had just finished a slow-motion crash. Over eight days, it fell 2,400 points, or 22 percent, and stood at 8,451.

One year later, the Dow is at 9,865. It's up 51 percent from a 12-year low of 6,547 on March 9 - when some investors feared the financial world was coming to an end.

But the complete story of the Dow's journey since the economy soured goes back a little further. Two years ago this week, on Oct. 7, 2007, the Dow set its record high of 14,164.

What followed was a three-act play. For five months, from October 2007 through the collapse of investment bank Bear Stearns in mid-March 2008, the Dow fell 2,000 points in an orderly fashion as investors anticipated a garden-variety recession. From mid-March until Labor Day, the Dow rose and fell but was little changed. Right after Labor Day, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Lehman Brothers and AIG failed over 10 days. The credit markets froze, and investors panicked, fearing another Great Depression. There were rallies amid the downward spiral that ensued, but over six months - until the low on March 9 - the Dow fell 5,000 points.

So where do we stand today?

The seven-month rally since March has yet to wipe away all the losses, but few expected that the Dow would be edging back to 10,000 so soon. Unemployment is close to 10 percent, but other parts of the economy are stabilizing. Consumers are still hunkered down, but retail sales showed a slight gain in September. The panic of last fall has been replaced by the resignation that the worst is over but it might be years before the economy booms again.

"The problems that we're dealing with - there's a little bit less urgency," says Alan Levenson, chief economist at T. Rowe Price Associates. "We've stopped what could have been fatal bleeding."

FULL story at link.

[thunder rising]

1. Not to worry 6 million H1-Bs are fully employed! 128K additional in the 12 month period