As policy makers look to address the effects of COVID 19 on the economy, they turn to the experience of the recent Great Recession as well as to the Great Depression for insights. In a recent blog (link below), Gita Gopinath, chief economist at the IMF, draws several comparisons. A recent article by Robert Shiller (Yale, Nobel Laureate) in the Sunday NY Times makes an even broader historical comparison. We would like you to identify several similarities as well as differences between the COVID 19 recession and past downturns and discuss their current policy implications.