Economic depression in the world

We create a dataset of country experience with economic depression around the world. We define a depression episode as a period of cumulative decline in per capita output of 20% or more lasting at least four years. We find depressions are surprisingly common. We describe their incidence and onset over decades, regions, and levels of development. We identify economic, political, financial, and cultural variables that are associated with depressions. Probit analysis reveals that the probability of entering or exiting a depression is influenced by domestic and international shocks.