It is clearly not going to end in a few months. We would be lucky to get done with it in the middle of next year.

—Jeffrey Frankel, a member of the NBER committee and a professor at Harvard University

Recent economic evidence suggests that the pace of this downturn is accelerating

—Lawrence Summers

This sets the stage for the Federal Reserve to be more formal in its adoption of quantitative easing

—Vincent Reinhart, the Fed’s director of monetary affairs until last year

But right now we have a fundamental shortfall in private spending: consumers are rediscovering the virtues of saving at the same moment that businesses, burned by past excesses and hamstrung by the troubles of the financial system, are cutting back on investment. That gap will eventually close, but until it does, government spending must take up the slack. Otherwise, private investment, and the economy as a whole, will plunge even more.

—Krugman arguing for deficit spending in exigent circumstances and against the likes of Amity Schlaes