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There was no reason why people who know economics would have expected a double dip recession, absent a meltdown in the euro zone. Unfortunately, policy debate tends to be dominated by people who don’t fall into this category, hence the discussion of a double dip.

The unfortunate result of a debate dominated by ignorance is that a terrible 3rd quarter GDP growth number is touted as better than expected. As the NYT tells us in its headline:

“U.S. Economy Picks Up Pace, Averting a Stall.”

At the economy’s 3rd quarter growth rate it will take us an infinite number of years to get back to normal levels of unemployment. There was no reason to expect the economy to stall, just like there is no reason to expect heavily armed Martians to take over earth tomorrow. There is no reason that anyone should be happy about the 3rd quarter growth data, it is awful. The fact that some economic “experts” expected worse just speaks to the state of economics.