Crisis needs to be given perspective.(Economic Development Council of Northeastern Pennsylvania)(Conference news)(Editorial)

At the annual meeting of the Economic Development Council (now the Northwest Economic Council), members were given some perspective.

On the screen at the presentation was a graph--the same graph you can find on page 7 of this issue--which demonstrated job loss now compared to six other economic downturns in the past 100 years. At the top of the graph are gentle dips over two to four years in which employment gradually declined and then gradually gained again until the downturn was over.

Compare that to the crash during the Great Depression, where the employment numbers fell and fell and fell--and there really is no comparison. Sometimes there's nothing like a …