Economy Shrank At 4.8% Pace In 1st Quarter. But Worst Is Yet To Come : Coronavirus Live Updates : NPR
The coronavirus pandemic is likely to trigger the sharpest recession in the United States since the Great Depression. An early signal of that came Wednesday, when the Commerce Department said the economy shrank at a 4.8% annual rate in the first three months of the year — the first quarterly contraction since 2014 and the largest since the Great Recession.
For the first 2 1/2 of those months, the economy was chugging along at a steady, if not spectacular pace. But the plug was suddenly pulled in mid-March — when bars, restaurants and retail shops were abruptly closed and tens of millions of Americans were ordered to stay home in an effort to slow the spread of the deadly disease. Deluge Continues: 26 Million Jobs Lost In Just 5 Weeks Coronavirus Live Updates Deluge Continues: 26 Million Jobs Lost In Just 5 Weeks
The first-quarter drop was the biggest since an 8.4% dive in the fourth quarter of 2008. It marked a reversal from the 2.1% growth rate at the end of 2019.