That's how long it took for a the NBER Eggheads to locate the bottom of the recent economic downturn – which is also associated with the end of the recession. As we know by now, the patient is recovering but much slower than we have seen after previous recessions. That's because this is the only recession that involved (or indeed was started by) a banking crisis — other than the great depression. In "Diminished expectations, double dips, and external shocks: The decade after the fall," Reinhart and Reinhart outline why the 2008 collapse of the US banking sector makes this recovery special.

Credit Suisse tells us in a few pictures why the the past year since the end of the recession is still not feeling like a "Recovery."