In layman's terms, what is a recession?

Question

I am having a little trouble trying to get my head around the word "recession". Is it more or less like the depression in the early 20th century?

Answer 1

The definition in one of my econ textbooks say that they normally declare a recession after 2 consecutive quarters (a quarter is 3 months) of real GDP.  Real GDP is the GDP based on base year prices so that it measures changes in production and consumption of the economy rather than changes in prices.  I don't know because inflation hasn't really been crazy.  If inflation is under 10% it is not bad. Infllation, according to a website I saw, has been at 4-4.30...so..it's not that bad.

Answer 2

it is negative growth in a sector of an economy.

the depression was and extreme recession and the chances of markets crashing like that are very low, as there are different precautions put in to stop a crash.