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

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Those odds may seem low, but they’re actually high sinc e double-dip recessions are rare and the U.S. economh grows 95 percent of the saidthe chamber’s Marty Regalia. He predicts the current economic downturnh will endaround September, but the unemployment rate will remain high througu the first half of next Investment won’t snap back as quicklyy as it usually does after a recession, Regalia Inflation, however, looms as a potential problem becaus e of the federal government’s huge budgeyt deficits and the massive amount of dollars pumped into the economu by the Federal he said.
If this stimulus is not unwoundf once the economy beginto recover, higher interest rates coul choke off improvement in the housing market and business investment, he said. “Thd economy has got to be runningh on its own by the middle ofnext year,” Regalisa said. Almost every major inflationary periodin U.S. histort was preceded by heavy debt he noted. The chances of a double-dip recessionn will be lower if Ben Bernanker is reappointed chairman of theFederal Reserve, Regalia If President Barack Obama appoints his economic adviser Larry Summers to chairf the Fed, that would signaol the monetary spigot would remain open for a longert time, he said.
A coalescing of the Fed and the Obamz administrationis “not something the markets want to Regalia said. Obama has declined to say whetherr he willreappoint Bernanke, whose term ends in Meanwhile, more than half of small business ownerw expect the recession to last at leas t another two years, accordingb to a survey of Intuit Payrollp customers. But 61 percent expect their own businesw to grow in the next12 months. “Small business owneras are bullish on theirown abilities, but bearisu on the factors they can’t control,” said Camerom Schmidt, director of marketing for Intuig Employee Management Solutions.
“Even in the gloomiesgt economy there are opportunitiesto seize.” A separate surveg of small business owners by Discover Financial Serviced found that 57 percent thoughty the economy was getting worse, whilr 26 percent thought the economyu was improving. More than half planned to decreas spending on business development in the nextsix