According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, the US economy shrank 0.9% during the second quarter of 2022, the second consecutive quarter of GDP contraction.

Real gross domestic product (GDP) decreased at an annual rate of 0.9 percent in the second quarter of 2022 (table 1), according to the "advance" estimate released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. In the first quarter, real GDP decreased 1.6 percent.

Using the common standard for an economy in recession first proposed by economist Julius Shiskin in 1974, the US economy is technically in recession—an assessment emphatically shared among alternative media outlets such as ZeroHedge and Breitbart, and dismissed by a White House looking to defend its economic track record heading into this fall’s midterm elections, pushing back against relying on the Shiskin standard by arguing that the US economy is merely “slowing down”.

"Coming off of last year’s historic economic growth — and regaining all the private sector jobs lost during the pandemic crisis — it’s no surprise that the economy is slowing down as the Federal Reserve acts to bring down inflation," Biden said Thursday in a statement. "But even as we face historic global challenges, we are on the right path and we will come through this transition stronger and more secure."