Robert S. McElvaine: Why presidents love economic euphemisms
... There is, however, one word Bush has not used: "recession."
It's but the latest chapter in a long history of euphemisms that politicians employ in hopes of making economic disasters not sound so bad. "Recession" was itself an early example. When the economy, still not recovered from the Great Depression that had begun in 1929, took a new nosedive in 1937, President Roosevelt's administration wanted to avoid terming it a "new depression" or "resumed depression," so they called it a "recession." Thereafter, "recession" joined "depression" as economic four-letter words.
But, eight years earlier, it has been "depression" that was the euphemism. Herbert Hoover referred to the economic collapse as a "depression" – a little dip – because it sounded far less severe than the word usually used for similar economic breakdowns in the past: "panic."
Although the word "recession" has remained in use for the past seven decades, it quickly became a negative one to be avoided. Leon Keyserling, an economic adviser to President Truman, proposed "downward correction" as an alternative to "recession." In 1958, speaking at the Gridiron Club, Sen. John F. Kennedy joked about President Eisenhower's fumbles with the English language in his attempts to put a better face on the recessions during his presidency by making up the following "quotation" from Ike: "We're now at the end of the beginning of the upturn of the downturn."
In the 1960s, "economic downturn" became the euphemism of choice. Alan Greenspan, while he was an economic adviser to President Ford, contributed "sideways waffle." During the Carter years, Americans were also treated to the marvelous "pause in recovery."...