Published Saturday, October 31, 2009

Economic recovery - 'it's going to take awhile'

Editorial

Despite indications this horrible recession has bottomed out, we have heard strong words this week that an economic turnaround is still more than a year away and that the state budget crisis will continue.

Noted economist Donald Ratajczak said at an Economic Forecast Breakfast that while he sees much optimism for 2011, he is not expecting much reason to celebrate in 2010.

Coweta state Sen. Mitch Seabaugh spoke to a group of Newnan-Coweta Chamber of Commerce members about the state budget. Seabaugh's comments were not positive, but likely realistic. He said the state budget crisis is nowhere near being over. The forecast is for continuing state revenue shortfalls to cause more massive state spending cuts for the next two years. Seabaugh says it's time to "identify what the state should be doing, fundamentally, and get the government out of the rest."

This economic downturn, which has been called the worst since the Great Depression, can't be fixed with a magic wand. There simply is no quick fix. It will take time. Ratajczak knows his stuff, and he is likely correct when he says it will be 2011 before we see growth in the economy.

Ratajczak said the pieces are slowly moving into place for recovery, but "it's going to take awhile to build that foundation."

We want a quicker fix, but that seems impossible.