Via the Office of the Chief Economist:
In the June 2020 Resources and Energy Quarterly (REQ) we pointed out that “unlike downturns in previous decades, this downturn was not due to the bursting of excesses built up in the financial system…or in equity markets…. It also differs from the 1970s recessions…which helped contribute to stagflation and forced a wholesale restructure of the world’s energy system.” An inference was that the current downturn would likely be sharp but short relative to those earlier episodes, particularly if COVID-19 containment measures were successful, and large fiscal and monetary stimulus took effect. And, so far, the downturn in output of the world’s industrial sector — the main consumer of energy and resource commodities — has indeed been sharp but relatively short.
