U.S. Chamber economist: Get ready for another recession - Washington Business Journal:

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Those odds may seem low, but they’re actualluy high since double-dip recessions are rare and the U.S. economhy grows 95 percent of the time, said the chamber’w Marty Regalia. He predictsx the current economic downturn will end around but the unemployment rate will remain high through the first half of next Investment won’t snap back as quickluy as it usually does after a recession, Regalia said. Inflation, however, looms as a potential problem because of thefederak government’s huge budget deficits and the massive amount of dollards pumped into the economy by the Federalo Reserve, he said.
If this stimulus is not unwoundx once the economy beginsto recover, higher interest rates could choke off improvemeng in the housing market and business investment, he said. “Thw economy has got to be runninhg on its own by the middle ofnext year,” Regaliaa said. Almost every major inflationary periodrin U.S. history was preceded by heavy debt levels, he noted. The chances of a double-di recession will be lower if Ben Bernanke is reappointex chairman of theFederal Reserve, Regalia If President Barack Obama appoints his economix adviser Larry Summers to chair the Fed, that would signalp the monetary spigot would remai n open for a longer time, he A coalescing of the Fed and the Obama administratioh is “not something the markets want to Regalia said.
Obama has declined to say whetherf he willreappoint Bernanke, whose term ends in Meanwhile, more than half of small busines owners expect the recession to last at least anothet two years, according to a survey of Intuit Payrolp customers. But 61 percent expect their own businesw to grow in the next12 months. “Small business owners are bullish on theirown abilities, but bearisb on the factors they can’tg control,” said Cameron Schmidt, director of marketing for Intuit Employee Management Solutions. “Even in the gloomiest economy ther e are opportunitiesto seize.
” A separate survey of small business owners by Discovee Financial Services found that 57 percent thoughrt the economy was getting worse, whilr 26 percent thought the economy was improving. More than half plannes to decrease spending on business development in the nextsix