The global economy appears to have begun recovering after entering into a double dip recession in December 2020, which looks to have bottomed in February 2020.
That assessment is based on the latest data on the changing concentration of carbon dioxide in the Earth's atmosphere recorded at the remote Mauna Loa Observatory. The trailing twelve month average of the year-over-year change in atmospheric CO₂ levels has begun to rise again, indicating a return to net economic growth for the Earth's economy beginning in March 2021.
We have to emphasize "net" economic growth since the change is not uniform across the globe. Many nations, particularly in the Eurozone, continue to experience recessionary conditions from government-imposed lockdowns as they see rising rates of infections combine with the fiasco of their failure to acquire adequate supplies of COVID vaccines.
As long as that situation continues, the global recovery will be much slower than the regional recoveries now underway.
Previously on Political Calculations
Here is our series quantifying the negative impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the Earth's economy, presented in reverse chronological order.
- Double Dip Global Coronavirus Recession Sees Second Bottom
- Net Global GDP Lost to Coronavirus Pandemic Tops $13.6 Trillion
- Global Double Dip Coronavirus Recession Deepens
- Global Economy Enters Double Dip Coronavirus Recession
- Global Economy Teeters on Double Dip Recession
- World GDP Lost Due to Coronavirus Reaches $12 Trillion
- Cumulative World GDP Loss From Coronavirus Pandemic Tops $11 Trillion
- Estimates of World GDP Lost to the Global Coronavirus Recession
- Finding Human Fingerprints in Atmospheric CO2
- The Coronavirus and Atmospheric CO2 in April 2020
- The Coronavirus, Atmospheric CO2, and GDP