The Weak Recovery

To follow up on Friday's disappointing GDP number: The economy has now grown at a 2.1 percent annual rate since the U.S. recovery began in mid-2009. In terms of average annual growth, that makes this expansion by far the weakest of any since 1949.

The prior expansion, from 2001 through 2007, was the only other business cycle of the past 11 when the economy didn’t grow at least 3 percent a year, on average.

Despite the current expansion’s lack of intensity, this recovery now stands as one of the longest. There have only been three longer expansions in the past seven decades. Total growth this expansion ranks 8th of the past 11 cycles. with the economy being 15.5 percent larger than it was when the recession ended in 2009.