For example, following the severe 1981–82 recession, discretionary fiscal policy contributed an average of about 1 percentage point per year to real GDP growth over the subsequent three years.4 However, discretionary fiscal policy hasn’t been much of a tailwind during this recovery.
In the year following the end of the recession, discretionary fiscal policy at the federal, state, and local levels boosted growth at roughly the same pace as in past recoveries, as exhibit 3  3  The results in the figure are derived from a model that relates GDP growth in recoveries to recession depth and duration.