Diane Swonk, chief economist at Grant Thornton, said we saw only a 4% increase in the last quarter of 2020. "And the slowdown we saw at the end of the year was driven by a slowdown in consumer spending," Swonk said. "The loss at grocery stores, we know, was showing up in those long food lines as people went hungry and their savings from the CARES Act ran out." Despite growth in the last two quarters for which we have data, Swonk said we're still recession territory with the employment picture as bad or worse than the heights of the Great Recession.

Marketplace's Nova Safo has more.