Fed Chair Warns Economy May Not Fully Rebound Until End of 2021, Could Require a Vaccine

Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell warned in an interview released on Sunday that a full economic rebound following the coronavirus pandemic may not occur until the end of 2021.

Powell described the sudden slowdown as the “biggest shock that the economy’s had in living memory” during the interview on CBS’s 60 Minutes.

“This economy will recover; it may take a while,” Powell said. “It may take a period of time, it could stretch through the end of next year, we really don’t know.”
Powell also said that a full economic recovery may depend on the availability of a coronavirus vaccine.

“Assuming that there’s not a second wave of the coronavirus, I think you’ll see the economy recover steadily through the second half of this year,” he said. “For the economy to fully recover, people will have to be fully confident, and that may have to await the arrival of a vaccine.”