Terry Savage thinks this weeks Wall Street Rally’s merely signaled the end of the beginning of the recession. The panic is over but the recession is in full swing:

If you’re asking about bear markets, historian Jim Stack says the median “bear market” duration since 1929 is 15 months. In 1929, the bear growled for 33 months and attacked again for 42 months, starting in 1938, ended only by World War II. More recently, we suffered through a 30-month bear market, starting from the peak in 2000.

The recession is another story. The average duration of post-World War II recessions is 11 months, from peak to bottom, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research. The longest decline came from November 1973 through March 1975, a 17-month recession. The last extended recession ran from July 1981 through November 1982. There was a brief downturn from July 1990 through March 1991.