Inventing The "Clinton Recession"

By Michael J. Mandel Businessweek 2/23/04

The CEA's Economic Report of the President, released Feb. 9, unilaterally changed the start date of the last recession to benefit Bush's reelection bid. Instead of using the accepted start date of March, 2001, the CEA announced that the recession really started in the fourth quarter of 2000 -- a shift that would make it much more credible for the Bush Administration to term it the "Clinton Recession."

… his decision to fiddle with economic convention can't be seen as anything less than manipulation in an election year. In his press conference, Mankiw justified his decision by saying, correctly, that the NBER panel was already considering moving the recession start date forward. Some key data that the NBER watch -- including industrial production and inflation-adjusted business sales -- peaked in mid-2000. On the other hand, the latest revisions from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shifted the peak of nonfarm employment slightly later, from February to March, 2001. That's important, because the recessions of 1981-82 and 1990-91 both started in or after the month that employment fell.

Link to Businessweek

Cooking hamburgers at McDonalds is also manufacturing.