As a consequence, the proportion of households that have been able to take advantage of declining rates to refinance their mortgages or to borrow to purchase new homes has probably been lower than in past recoveries. In addition, pronounced uncertainty about economic conditions has weighed on capital spending decisions and may have blunted the normal effect of lower interest rates on business investment.
These are the major reasons why I believe this recovery has been so slow. After a lengthy recession that imposed great hardships on American workers, the weak recovery has made the past five years the toughest that many of today’s workers have ever experienced. The unemployment rate now stands at 7.9 percent.