By when will the US have had 3 consecutive quarters of GDP growth?

when hell freezes over :) if u had that option i would have a choice then

Updated: Q1 2009 GDP now available
http://www.bea.gov/briefrm/gdp.htm

Comment on #2. What catastrophic event happened in the last quarter of 2008? Or is the chart accidentally printed upside down?

Are you talking about the "Gross Domestic Product"?

Yes.

One of the straws that buried the camel was Bush: "I've abandoned free-market principles to save the free-market system, to make sure the economy doesn't collapse." Brilliant... NOT!

Many places to lay the blame... but looking to the future we have Obama's gang of very qualified tax cheats piling up massive debt against the faith and credit of future generations... "The pain has trickled up!"

"Believe," "Hope," "Change," "Just words?"

I think part of the problem was when people saw the Democrats and the Mavericks all agreeing that the only way to recover everything was with a TARP plan.

The auto industry, banking, and insurance sectors would all have a large effect on the the Gross Domestic Product

Question is being extended since we haven't even had one quarter yet and the question runs into 2011...so let's move the suspension date to August, 2010...

I wish "When moneys fly out of my butt" was an option.

the trouble with you, EX, is that you live in the past....

It's pretty much a forgone conclusion that Q3-09 will be positive, probably at least +2.0%, some think +3.5%. I expect to see some slowdown in Q4-09, but not likely to go negative. Q1-10 is highly likely to go + as well, so I don't get why so much money is being piled on Not-in-a-million-years here. Must be some old "double-dip recession" holdovers. IT'S NOT GONNA HAPPEN.

Industrial output increased at a 5.2 percent annual rate in the July-September quarter, the Fed said, the largest quarterly gain since the first three months of 2005. It's also the first quarterly increase since the beginning of 2008. http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Industrial-output-up-more-apf-1970477766.html?x=0&sec=topStories&pos=2&asset=&ccode=

Well, a 3.5% growth in GDP is not bad, for starts. Of course, some of this was clunker and government stimulus driven, but only about half of the nearly 800 billion stimulus money has been spent so far, so there will be continuing influx into the economy for a while. The growth rate will likely slow down a bit, but should be comfortably positive for the next two quarters. It will be a tidy sum I will collect come next February. :-)

Well, even half a year is a long time...

This could be settled at the earliest in May next year.

OK, my bad, you are right BG, I was not thinking clearly. I can wait - it will be worth it.

FYI, q2 2010 is not possible. Think about it...

Pretty good start for Q4 09!
NEW YORK (Reuters) - The U.S. manufacturing sector grew in October for the third consecutive month and at a faster rate than was expected.
The Institute for Supply Management said its index of national factory activity rose to 55.7 in October from 52.6 in September. The median forecast of 74 economists surveyed by Reuters was for a reading of 53.
The October reading was the highest since 56.0 in April 2006.

Investors Needn’t Fear a Double-Dip Recession
By Jon D. Markman, Contributing Writer, Money Morning

A new report contains some very good news for investors: Double-dip recessions are very rare.

That means that a drop back into recessionary conditions looks less and less likely even as unemployment creeps higher and has crossed the 10% threshold for the first time in a quarter century. After reviewing U.S. economic history all the way back to the 1850s, Deutsche Bank AG (NYSE: DB) economists found that double-dip recessions are exceedingly rare: There have only been three episodes in which the economy has fallen back into recession within a year of a previous recession ending. And that’s out of 33 recessions that have taken place since 1854.

Indeed, when these double-dip downturns do occur, they happen under circumstances quite different from today’s situation. Two of the three double-dips happened in the years prior to World War II - in 1913, and again in 1920. The more relevant example was the double-dip recession of the early 1980s, which was driven by the fight against double-digit inflation rates.
U.S. President Jimmy Carter imposed credit controls in March 1980, which resulted in a sharp but short-lived recession before the economy expanded again for 12 months. Then U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Paul A. Volker hiked short-term interest rates to 20% in the summer of 1981, as he pushed the economy back into recession but dealt a death blow to inflation.

With deflation just as likely as inflation at the moment, a repeat of the 1980s just isn’t in the cards, as the Fed is set to keep rates at very low levels until the end of 2010.