The U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) has issued the following news release today:

Real gross domestic product — the output of goods and services produced by labor and property located in the United States — decreased at an annual rate of 6.3 percent in the fourth quarter of 2008, (that is, from the third quarter to the fourth quarter), according to final estimates released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis.

Based on BEA data, the last time we had such a drop in real GDP was during the first quarter of 1982 . Back then, the economy contracted by 6.4 percent over the previous quarter.