Weekly Wrap: A nascent recovery

CNBC’s John Carney and the Wall Street Journal’s Sudeep Reddy discuss the week’s biggest business headlines.

On the payroll tax cut compromise:

Sudeep Reddy: Yeah everything seems like it’s working finally. Except all we’ve really done is put off these decisions — we’ve put them off for nine months until after the election. Income taxes, payroll taxes, the debt ceiling — all of it’s going to come up. And if you really believe that policy uncertainty has been a factor in holding back this incredibly weak recovery that we’ve had over the last three years, then you have to be worried about all the policy uncertainty that we’ve put in that doesn’t trigger for nine months.

On whether we’re on our way to full recovery:

John Carney: Right now, it looks like the economy is doing much better. Politicians seem to be able to get along with each other. This doesn’t mean that there’s no dangers in the world, but if those things don’t erupt in a bad way, I think actually we stand a chance of doing pretty well.

For more analysis, listen to the full audio above.