New Recession Indicator Developed by San Francisco Fed Researchers

According to PANews, researchers at the San Francisco Federal Reserve have introduced a new recession warning tool to aid economists in assessing the likelihood of a U.S. economic downturn. The tool, named the Labor Market Stress Indicator (LMSI), evaluates regional differences in the labor market by counting the number of states where the unemployment rate has risen by at least 0.5 percentage points from its lowest level in the past 12 months. The research report highlights that when 30 or more states experience a rapid increase in unemployment rates simultaneously, the national economy almost invariably enters a recession. The LMSI method is transparent, focusing solely on states with accelerating unemployment rates, making it easy to interpret while offering valuable insights into the geographic distribution of economic stress.