What the Experts Are Saying About Our Economy's Future

Many different people have different opinions about what the future of our economy holds. Some experts believe that the recession is finally coming to an end while others believe that the recession is not over and that there is, what experts are calling, a double dip recession. A double dip recession, otherwise known as a W-shaped recession, gets its name from the fact that an economy recovering from negative GDP growth will "dip" back into a recession after experiencing a short period of growth. In any case, unemployment is still up around 10 percent, consumers are still not spending, and banks are still not lending.

There are experts that are saying that the recession is finally over. Sam Stovall, Chief Investment Strategist of Standard and Poor's Equity Research, has said "We're getting better than expected economic data, which is making investors believe that we are now moving further and further from the deflation and double dip precipice and as a result, that pushed share prices out of the 100 point range we've experienced since April of this year and now I believe from a technical perspective, we're going to re-challenge that April 23rd high" (Nightly Business Report). According to Stovall, based on how the stock market is performing, investors are starting to believe in the recovery of our economy and their fear of a double dip recession is fading.

Another expert that believes the economy is no longer in a recession is Steve Forbes, CEO and Editor-in-Chief of Forbes Magazine. Forbes believes that the United States is not headed for a double dip recession and goes further to say that he believes that there will be an economic boom that rivals that of the 1990's.

Billionaire chairman, founder, and CEO of Fisher Investments, Ken Fisher, is also a strong believer that our economy is on the up rise. Fisher goes on to say "The world right now is being led by the emerging markets, not by America. The U.S. is going to be big and important, but it is secondary. It is no longer what it once was. If you read the media from 1991 it sounds just like it does today. We're chimpanzees with no memory. Our problems in this environment that we think are so unique, so abnormal. It is the same stupid old normal we've always had. We keep chewing the cud. We go over the same stupid wrong pessimistic stories...ruminating on them again and again. I believe the next 10 years will be just as good as the 1990s. In my mind, I think the period we have ahead of us is as good as we have ever had, at a time when people believe we have a lackluster world ahead at best" (Fisher Investments). He and Forbes both believe that the time to start making money again is coming sooner rather than later.

Another supporter of the theory that the economy is going to get better is Barry Ritholtz who is the author of financial blog The Big Picture, frequent media commentator and CEO of Fusion IQ. Ritholtz posted a blog that said "No, we are not still in a recession as some people have asserted. No, it's not a depression. The wheel has turned, the trough is more than a year behind us. This is not a robust recovery, but the economy is now expanding, not contracting" (The Big Picture).

There are also the experts that believe that the economy's future is not so bright. Warren Buffett, CEO of Berkshire Hathaway and arguably the greatest investor alive, said in an interview with CNBC "On any common sense definition, the average American is below where he was before, or his family, in terms of real income, GDP. We're still in a recession. And we're not going to be out of it for a while, but we will get out of it. We've used up a lot of bullets. And we talk about stimulus. But the truth is, we're running a federal deficit that's 9 percent of GDP. That is stimulative as all get out. It's more stimulative than any policy we've followed since World War II" (CNBC). He believes that we are still in a recession because there are people that are still suffering and the government is spending too much money.

Timothy F. Giethner, Secretary of the Treasury of the United States of America, agrees with Buffett and has said "We had a decade where the middle class saw no growth in income. And we saw a huge, devastating financial crisis that put more than eight million Americans out of work, forced businesses across the country to close. But we've now been growing for more than a year. We had private sector job growth start much earlier than it did in the last two