EXPLAINER: How do we know when a recession has begun?

By CHRISTOPHER RUGABER
AP Economics Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) — By one common definition, the U.S. economy is on the cusp of a recession. Yet that definition isn’t the one that counts. On Thursday, when the government estimates the gross domestic product for the April-June period, some economists think it may show the economy shrank for a second straight quarter. That would meet a longstanding assumption for when a recession has begun. But economists say that wouldn’t mean that a recession had begun. During those same six months when the economy might have contracted, businesses and other employers added a prodigious 2.7 million jobs  — more than were gained in most entire years before the pandemic.