The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) is an American private

nonprofit A nonprofit organization (NPO), also known as a nonbusiness entity, nonprofit institution, not-for-profit organization, or simply a nonprofit, is a non-governmental (private) legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public, or so ...

research organization "committed to undertaking and disseminating unbiased economic research among public policymakers, business professionals, and the academic community." The NBER is known for proposing start and end dates for

recession In economics, a recession is a business cycle contraction that occurs when there is a period of broad decline in economic activity. Recessions generally occur when there is a widespread drop in spending (an adverse demand shock). This may be tr ...

s in the United States. Many chairpersons of the

Council of Economic Advisers The Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) is a United States agency within the Executive Office of the President established in 1946, which advises the president of the United States on economic policy. The CEA provides much of the empirical resea ...

were previously NBER research associates, including the former NBER president and

Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher lear ...

professor

Martin Feldstein Martin Stuart Feldstein ( ; November 25, 1939 – June 11, 2019) was an American economist. He was the George F. Baker Professor of Economics at Harvard University and the president emeritus of the National Bureau of Economic Research. He s ...

. The NBER's current president and CEO is James M. Poterba of

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Established in 1861, MIT has played a significant role in the development of many areas of modern technology and sc ...

History

Founding

The NBER was established in 1920 following debates during the Progressive era over income distribution. Founded by Malcolm Rorty and Nachum Stone, the NBER aimed to fill the information gap on economic data. The organization's research is restricted to presenting data and findings without making policy recommendations.

Early years

The NBER initially received support from the Carnegie Foundation, the

Laura Spelman Rockefeller Laura Celestia "Cettie" Spelman Rockefeller (September 9, 1839 – March 12, 1915) was an American abolitionist, philanthropist, school teacher, and prominent member of the Rockefeller family. Her husband was Standard Oil co-founder John D. Rocke ...

Foundation, and various corporations.

Columbia University Columbia University in the City of New York, commonly referred to as Columbia University, is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Churc ...

professor

Wesley Clair Mitchell Wesley Clair Mitchell (August 5, 1874 – October 29, 1948) was an American economist known for his empirical work on business cycles and for guiding the National Bureau of Economic Research in its first decades. Mitchell was referred to as Thor ...

was the first director of research, guiding the organization's research for 25 years. The NBER's initial projects included measuring labor's share of national income and studying unemployment and business-cycle fluctuations.

Simon Kuznets

In 1927, Mitchell brought in

Simon Kuznets Simon Smith Kuznets ( ; rus, Семён Абра́мович Кузне́ц, p=sʲɪˈmʲɵn ɐˈbraməvʲɪtɕ kʊzʲˈnʲets; April 30, 1901 – July 8, 1985) was a Russian-born American economist and statistician who received the 1971 Nobe ...

, who later played a pivotal role in developing the U.S. national income accounts. Kuznets' work laid the foundation for the

Nobel Prize The Nobel Prizes ( ; ; ) are awards administered by the Nobel Foundation and granted in accordance with the principle of "for the greatest benefit to humankind". The prizes were first awarded in 1901, marking the fifth anniversary of Alfred N ...

he received in 1971.

Post-War expansion

After World War II, the NBER expanded its research scope.

Arthur Burns Arthur Frank Burns (April 27, 1904 – June 26, 1987) was an American economist and diplomat who served as the 10th chairman of the Federal Reserve from 1970 to 1978. He previously chaired the Council of Economic Advisers under President Dwight ...

succeeded Mitchell as research director. The 1950s and 1960s saw groundbreaking work by

Milton Friedman Milton Friedman (; July 31, 1912 – November 16, 2006) was an American economist and statistician who received the 1976 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for his research on consumption analysis, monetary history and theory and ...

and

Anna Schwartz Anna Jacobson Schwartz (pronounced ; November 11, 1915 – June 21, 2012) was an American economist who worked at the National Bureau of Economic Research in New York City and a writer for ''The New York Times''. Paul Krugman has said that Sch ...

on monetary policy's impact on business cycles. Research in labor economics also flourished during this period.

Presidential leadership

Arthur Burns became NBER's president in 1956, followed by John R. Meyer in 1967. Meyer introduced several initiatives, including two NBER journals and the establishment of NBER offices in various cities.

Martin Feldstein era

In 1977, Martin S. Feldstein became the NBER's president, transforming the organization. He expanded the NBER's network of university-based affiliates, moved its headquarters to

Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. It is a suburb in the Greater Boston metropolitan area, located directly across the Charles River from Boston. The city's population as of the 2020 United States census, ...

and introduced the NBER Working Paper Series. Feldstein also established research programs focusing on specific areas and initiated the NBER Summer Institute.

Recent years

James Poterba James Michael "Jim" Poterba, FBA is an American economist who is the Mitsui Professor of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and current National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) president and chief executive officer. Earl ...

succeeded Feldstein in 2008, continuing the NBER's expansion. The number of affiliated researchers grew significantly, and new programs and working groups were introduced. The NBER now distributes over 1,200 new research studies annually and holds around 125 meetings each year on various economic topics. In September 2010, after a conference call with its Business Cycle Dating Committee, the NBER declared that the

Great Recession The Great Recession was a period of market decline in economies around the world that occurred from late 2007 to mid-2009.

in the United States had officially ended in 2009 and lasted from December 2007 to June 2009. In response, a number of newspapers wrote that the majority of Americans did not believe the recession was over, mainly because they were still struggling and because the country still faced high unemployment.

Research

The NBER's research activities encompass 20 research programs on different subjects and 14 working groups.

Research programs

* Asset Pricing * Children * Corporate Finance * Development Economics * Development of the American Economy * Economic Fluctuations and Growth * Economics of Aging * Economics of Education * Environment and Energy Economics * Health Care * Health Economics * Industrial Organization * International Finance and Macroeconomics * International Trade and Investment * Labor Studies * Law and Economics * Monetary Economics * Political Economy * Productivity, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship * Public Economics

Working groups

* Behavioral Finance * Chinese Economy * Cohort Studies * Economics of Crime * Entrepreneurship * Risks of Financial Institutions * Household Finance * Innovation Policy * Insurance * Market Design * Organizational Economics * Personnel Economics * Race and Stratification in the Economy * Urban Economics

Conferences

The NBER convenes over 120 meetings each year at which researchers share and discuss their latest findings and launch new projects. The Summer Institute, a collection of nearly 50 smaller meetings, is held annually in July.

Notable members

Winners of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences

Daron Acemoglu Kamer Daron Acemoğlu (;, ; born September 3, 1967) is a Turkish Americans, Turkish-American economist of Armenians in Turkey, Armenian descent who has taught at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology since 1993, where he is currently the Ja ...

, 2024 * Simon Johnson, 2024 * James A. Robinson, 2024 *

Claudia Goldin Claudia Dale Goldin (born May 14, 1946) is an American economic historian and labor economist. She is the Henry Lee Professor of Economics at Harvard University. In October 2023, she was awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences "fo ...

, 2023 *

Ben Bernanke Ben Shalom Bernanke ( ; born December 13, 1953) is an American economist who served as the 14th chairman of the Federal Reserve from 2006 to 2014. After leaving the Federal Reserve, he was appointed a distinguished fellow at the Brookings Insti ...

, 2022 *

Joshua Angrist Joshua David Angrist (; born September 18, 1960) is an Israeli American economist and Ford Professor of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Angrist, together with Guido Imbens, was awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Eco ...

, 2021 *

David Card David Edward Card (born 1956) is a Canadian-American labour economist and the Class of 1950 Professor of Economics at the University of California, Berkeley, where he has been since 1997. He was awarded half of the 2021 Nobel Memorial Prize in ...

, 2021 *

Guido Imbens Guido Wilhelmus Imbens (born 3 September 1963) is a Dutch-American economist whose research concerns econometrics and statistics. He holds the Applied Econometrics Professorship in Economics at the Stanford Graduate School of Business at Stanf ...

, 2021 *

Abhijit Banerjee Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee (; born 21 February 1961) is an Indian American economist who is currently the Ford Foundation International Professor of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is co-founder and co-director of the ...

, 2019 *

Esther Duflo Esther Duflo, FBA (; born 25 October 1972) is a French-American economist currently serving as the Abdul Latif Jameel Professor of Poverty Alleviation and Development Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). In 2019, she w ...

, 2019 *

Michael Kremer Michael Robert Kremer (born November 12, 1964) is an American Development economics, development economist currently serving as university professor in economics at the University of Chicago and director of the Development Innovation Lab at th ...

, 2019 *

William Nordhaus William Dawbney Nordhaus (born May 31, 1941) is an American economist. He was a Sterling Professor of Economics at Yale University, best known for his work in economic modeling and climate change, and a co-recipient of the 2018 Nobel Memorial ...

, 2018 *

Paul Romer Paul Michael Romer (born November 6, 1955) is an American economist and policy entrepreneur who is a Seidner University Professor in Finance at Boston College. Romer is best known as the former Chief Economist of the World Bank and for co- ...

, 2018 *

Richard Thaler Richard H. Thaler (; born September 12, 1945) is an American economist and the Charles R. Walgreen Distinguished Service Professor of Behavioral Science and Economics at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. In 2015, Thaler was p ...

, 2017 * Oliver Hart, 2016 *

Bengt Holmström Bengt Robert Holmström (born 18 April 1949) is a Finnish economist who is currently Paul A. Samuelson Professor of Economics (Emeritus) at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Together with Oliver Hart, he received the Central Bank of Swe ...

, 2016 *

Angus Deaton Sir Angus Stewart Deaton (born 19 October 1945) is a British-American economist and academic. Deaton is currently a Senior Scholar and the Dwight D. Eisenhower Professor of Economics and International Affairs Emeritus at the Princeton School ...

, 2015 *

Lars Peter Hansen Lars Peter Hansen (born 26 October 1952 in Urbana, Illinois) is an Americans, American economy, economist. He is the David Rockefeller Distinguished Service Professor in Economics, Statistics, and the Booth School of Business, at the Universi ...

, 2013 *

Robert J. Shiller Robert James Shiller (born March 29, 1946) is an American economist, academic, and author. As of 2022, he served as a Sterling Professor of Economics at Yale University and is a fellow at the Yale School of Management's International Center fo ...

, 2013 *

Alvin E. Roth Alvin Eliot Roth (born December 18, 1951) is an American academic. He is the Craig and Susan McCaw professor of economics at Stanford University and the George Gund (philanthropist), Gund professor of economics and business administration emeri ...

, 2012 * Thomas J. Sargent, 2011 * Christopher A. Sims, 2011 *

Peter Diamond Peter Arthur Diamond (born , 1940) is an American economist known for his analysis of U.S. Social Security policy and his work as an advisor to the Advisory Council on Social Security in the late 1980s and 1990s. He was awarded the Nobel Memor ...

, 2010 *

Dale T. Mortensen Dale Thomas Mortensen (February 2, 1939 – January 9, 2014) was an American economist, a professor at Northwestern University, and a winner of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences. Early life and education Mortensen was born in Enter ...

, 2010 *

Paul Krugman Paul Robin Krugman ( ; born February 28, 1953) is an American New Keynesian economics, New Keynesian economist who is the Distinguished Professor of Economics at the CUNY Graduate Center, Graduate Center of the City University of New York. He ...

, 2008 *

Finn E. Kydland Finn Erling Kydland (born 1 December 1943) is a Norwegian economist known for his contributions to business cycle theory. He is the Henley Professor of Economics at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He also holds the Richard P. Simmon ...

, 2004 *

Edward C. Prescott Edward Christian Prescott (December 26, 1940 – November 6, 2022) was an American economist. He received the Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel, Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics in 2004, sharing the award with ...

, 2004 * Robert F. Engle, 2003 *

George Akerlof George Arthur Akerlof (born June 17, 1940) is an American economist and a university professor at the McCourt School of Public Policy at Georgetown University and Koshland Professor of Economics Emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley. ...

, 2001 *

Joseph Stiglitz Joseph Eugene Stiglitz (; born February 9, 1943) is an American New Keynesian economist, a public policy analyst, political activist, and a professor at Columbia University. He is a recipient of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences (2 ...

, 2001 *

James Heckman James Joseph Heckman (born April 19, 1944) is an American economist and Nobel laureate who serves as the Henry Schultz Distinguished Service Professor in Economics at the University of Chicago, where he is also a professor at the college, a pro ...

, 2000 *

Daniel McFadden Daniel Little McFadden (born July 29, 1937) is an American econometrician who shared the 2000 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences with James Heckman. McFadden's share of the prize was "for his development of theory and methods for analyzin ...

, 2000 *

Robert C. Merton Robert Cox Merton (born July 31, 1944) is an American economist, Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences laureate, and professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management, known for his pioneering contributions to continuous-time finance, especia ...

, 1997 *

Myron Scholes Myron Samuel Scholes ( ; born July 1, 1941) is a Canadian– American financial economist. Scholes is the Frank E. Buck Professor of Finance, Emeritus, at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, Nobel Laureate in Economic Sciences, and co-ori ...

, 1997 *

Robert Lucas Jr. Robert Emerson Lucas Jr. (September 15, 1937 – May 15, 2023) was an American economist at the University of Chicago. Widely regarded as the central figure in the development of the New classical macroeconomics, new classical approach to macr ...

, 1995 *

Robert Fogel Robert William Fogel (; July 1, 1926 – June 11, 2013) was an American economic historian and winner (with Douglass North) of the 1993 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences. As of his death, he was the Charles R. Walgreen Distinguished Se ...

, 1993 *

Gary Becker Gary Stanley Becker (; December 2, 1930 – May 3, 2014) was an American economist who received the 1992 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences. He was a professor of economics and sociology at the University of Chicago, and was a leader of ...

, 1992 *

George Stigler George Joseph Stigler (; January 17, 1911 – December 1, 1991) was an American economist. He was the 1982 laureate in Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences and is considered a key leader of the Chicago school of economics. Early life and e ...

, 1982 *

Theodore Schultz Theodore William Schultz ( ; 30 April 1902 – 26 February 1998) was an American agricultural economist and chairman of the University of Chicago Department of Economics. Schultz rose to national prominence after winning the 1979 Nobel Memoria ...

, 1979 *

, 1976 *

Wassily Leontief Wassily Wassilyevich Leontief (; August 5, 1905 – February 5, 1999) was a Soviet-American economist known for his research on input–output analysis and how changes in one economic sector may affect other sectors. Leontief won the Nobel Memo ...

, 1973 *

, 1971

Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) Chairs

Cecilia Rouse Cecilia Elena Rouse ( ; born December18, 1963) is an American economist and the President of the Brookings Institution. She served as the 30th Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers between 2021 and 2023. She is the first Black American to ho ...

, 2021–2023 *

Alan Krueger Alan Bennett Krueger (September 17, 1960 – March 16, 2019) was an American economist who was the James Madison Professor of Political Economy at Princeton University and Research Associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research. He served ...

, 2011–2013 *

Austan Goolsbee Austan Dean Goolsbee (born August 18, 1969) is an American economist and writer. He is the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. Goolsbee formerly served as the Robert P. Gwinn Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago's Boo ...

, 2010–2011 *

Christina Romer Christina Duckworth Romer (née Duckworth; born December 25, 1958) is the Class of 1957 Garff B. Wilson Professor of Economics at the University of California, Berkeley and a former chair of the Council of Economic Advisers in the Presidency of Ba ...

, 2009–2010 *

Edward Lazear Edward Paul Lazear (, ; August 17, 1948November 23, 2020) was an American economist, the Morris Arnold and Nona Jean Cox Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University and the Davies Family Professor of Economics at Stanford Gradu ...

, 2006–2009 *

, 2005–2006 * Harvey S. Rosen, 2005 *

Greg Mankiw Nicholas Gregory Mankiw ( ; born February 3, 1958) is an American macroeconomist who is currently the Robert M. Beren Professor of Economics at Harvard University. Mankiw is best known in academia for his work on New Keynesian economics. Man ...

, 2003–2005 * Glenn Hubbard, 2001–2003 *

Janet Yellen Janet Louise Yellen (born August 13, 1946) is an American economist who served as the 78th United States secretary of the treasury from 2021 to 2025. She also served as chair of the Federal Reserve from 2014 to 2018. She was the first woman to h ...

, 1997–1999 *

, 1995–1997 *

Michael Boskin Michael Jay Boskin (born September 23, 1945) is the T. M. Friedman Professor of Economics and senior fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution. He also is chief executive officer and president of Boskin & Co., an economic consulting comp ...

, 1989–1993 *

, 1982–1984 *

Arthur F. Burns Arthur Frank Burns (April 27, 1904 – June 26, 1987) was an American economist and diplomat who served as the 10th chair of the Federal Reserve, chairman of the Federal Reserve from 1970 to 1978. He previously chaired the Council of Economic Ad ...

, 1953–1956

Other notable members

Alberto Alesina Alberto Francesco Alesina (29 April 1957 – 23 May 2020) was an Italian economist who was the Nathaniel Ropes Professor of Political Economy at Harvard University from 2003 until his death in 2020. He was known principally as an economist of po ...

Susan Athey Susan Carleton Athey (born November 1970) is an American economist. She is the Economics of Technology Professor in the School of Humanities and Sciences at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. Prior to joining Stanford, she has been a profe ...

Robert Barro Robert Joseph Barro (born September 28, 1944) is an American macroeconomist and the Paul M. Warburg Professor of Economics at Harvard University. Barro is considered one of the founders of new classical macroeconomics, along with Robert Lucas ...

Olivier Blanchard Olivier Jean Blanchard (; born December 27, 1948) is a French economist and professor. He is Robert M. Solow Professor Emeritus of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Professor of Economics at the Paris School of Economics, an ...

John H. Cochrane John Howland Cochrane ( ; born 26 November 1957) is an American economist who has served as the Rose-Marie and Jack Anderson Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution since 2015. A specialist in financial economics and macroeconomics, he has been a ...

Aaron Edlin Aaron S. Edlin (born 1967) is an American economist and lawyer specializing in antitrust and competition policy. In 1997–1998, he served in the Clinton White House as Senior Economist within the Council of Economic Advisers focusing on the ar ...

John Lipsky John Phillip Lipsky (born February 19, 1947) is an American economist. He was the acting managing director of the International Monetary Fund from May to July 2011. He assumed the post of acting managing director after Dominique Strauss-Kahn was ...

Francis Longstaff Francis A. Longstaff (born August 3, 1956) is an American educator and pioneer in quantitative finance. He serves as the Allstate Professor of Insurance and Finance at the Anderson School of Management, University of California, Los Angeles, an ...

* Alan Marcus * Richard N. Rosett *

Eduardo Schwartz Eduardo Saul Schwartz (born 1940) is a professor of finance at SFU's Beedie School of Business, where he holds the Ryan Beedie Chair in Finance. He is also a Distinguished Research Professor at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is kno ...

Andrei Shleifer Andrei Shleifer ( ; born February 20, 1961) is a Russian-American economist and Professor of Economics at Harvard University, where he has taught since 1991. Shleifer was awarded the biennial John Bates Clark Medal in 1999 for his seminal works ...

Richard Zeckhauser Richard Jay Zeckhauser (born 1940) is an American economist and the Frank P. Ramsey Professor of Political Economy at Harvard Kennedy School at Harvard University. Life Zeckhauser holds a B.A., ''summa cum laude'', and a Ph.D. in economics fro ...

Funding

The NBER is funded by grants from government agencies, private foundations, corporate and individual contributions, and income from the NBER's investment portfolio. The largest donators are the

National Institutes of Health The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is the primary agency of the United States government responsible for biomedical and public health research. It was founded in 1887 and is part of the United States Department of Health and Human Service ...

, the

National Science Foundation The U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) is an Independent agencies of the United States government#Examples of independent agencies, independent agency of the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government that su ...

, the

Social Security Administration The United States Social Security Administration (SSA) is an Independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the Federal government of the United States, U.S. federal government that administers Social Security (United ...

, and the

Alfred P. Sloan Foundation The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation is an American philanthropic nonprofit organization. It was established in 1934 by Alfred P. Sloan Jr., president and chief executive officer of General Motors. The Sloan Foundation makes grants to support origina ...

Policy impact

In a 2010 report by the

University of Pennsylvania The University of Pennsylvania (Penn or UPenn) is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. One of nine colonial colleges, it was chartered in 1755 through the efforts of f ...

, the NBER was ranked as the second most influential domestic economic policy think tank, after the

Brookings Institution The Brookings Institution, often stylized as Brookings, is an American think tank that conducts research and education in the social sciences, primarily in economics (and tax policy), metropolitan policy, governance, foreign policy, global econo ...

Recession markers

The NBER is known for its start and end dates of U.S. recessions. The NBER is seen by some as an arbiter of whether the U.S. is in a recession. The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) does not function as a real-time arbiter in determining the onset and duration of recessions but rather as a retrospective marker. The origins of this role can be traced to the 1960s when the Commerce Department began publishing a digest that relied on NBER's analysis of the business cycle. The recession markers are made by the Business Cycle Dating Committee, whose eight members are selected by the president of the NBER. The eight members tend to be highly distinguished economists. The NBER's Business Cycle Dating Committee, responsible for officially dating recessions, does not make real-time judgments or predict economic downturns. The committee's meetings are neither publicized nor on a fixed schedule. The board's decisions are not always unanimous, but the disagreements within the committee tend not to be about the presence of a recession; rather they are about the specific start and end points of the recession. The NBER uses a broader definition of a

than commonly appears in the media. The media commonly define a recession as two consecutive quarters of a shrinking

gross domestic product Gross domestic product (GDP) is a monetary measure of the total market value of all the final goods and services produced and rendered in a specific time period by a country or countries. GDP is often used to measure the economic performanc ...

(GDP). In contrast, the NBER defines a recession as "a significant decline in economic activity spread across the economy, lasting more than a few months, normally visible in real GDP, real income, employment, industrial production, and wholesale-retail sales". Business cycle dates are determined by the NBER dating committee. Typically, these dates correspond to peaks and troughs in real GDP, although not always so. The NBER prefers this method for a variety of reasons. First, it believes that by measuring a wide range of economic factors, rather than just GDP, a more accurate assessment of the health of an economy can be gained. For instance, the NBER considers not only the product-side estimates like GDP, but also income-side estimates such as the

gross domestic income The Gross Domestic Income (GDI) is the total factor income payment done by all residents within a country. It includes the sum of all wages, profits, and indirect taxes, minus subsidies. Nominal GDI and Nominal gross domestic product (GDP) are exa ...

(GDI). Second, since the NBER attempts to measure the duration of economic expansion and recession at a fine grain, it emphasized monthly, rather than quarterly, economic indicators. Finally, by using a looser definition, the NBER can take into account the depth of decline in economic activity. For example, the NBER may declare not a recession simply because of two quarters of very slight negative growth, but rather an

economic stagnation Economic stagnation is a prolonged period of slow economic growth (traditionally measured in terms of the GDP growth), usually accompanied by high unemployment. Under some definitions, ''slow'' means significantly slower than potential growth as ...

. However, the NBER does not precisely define what is meant by "a significant decline", but rather determines if one has existed on a case by case basis after examining catalogued factors that have no defined grade scale or weighting factors. The subjectivity of the determination has led to criticism and accusations committee members can "play politics" in their determinations. Another factor in favor of this alternate definition is that a long-term economic contraction may not always have two consecutive quarters of negative growth, as was the case in the recession following the bursting of the

dot-com bubble The dot-com bubble (or dot-com boom) was a stock market bubble that ballooned during the late-1990s and peaked on Friday, March 10, 2000. This period of market growth coincided with the widespread adoption of the World Wide Web and the Interne ...

References

External links

Official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:National Bureau Of Economic Research 1920 establishments in the United States 1920 in economic history Economic research institutes Non-profit organizations based in Massachusetts Organizations established in 1920 Political and economic think tanks in the United States Research institutes in Massachusetts

History

Founding

Early years

Simon Kuznets

Post-War expansion

Presidential leadership

Martin Feldstein era

Recent years

Research

Research programs

Working groups

Conferences

Notable members

Winners of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences

Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) Chairs

Other notable members

Funding

Policy impact

Recession markers

See also

References

External links