President Trump’s fear of Joe Biden seems well-founded, especially since Biden is now favored to move into the White House in 2021, by some estimates.

“With Trump facing an unlikely reelection, this means it is most likely at this point Joe Biden will win the general election in November,” Washington, DC research firm Sandhill Strategies predicted in a March 16 analysis. The coronavirus outbreak has triggered a bear market in stocks and a likely recession, which is a death sentence for presidential reelection hopes. “No U.S. President has won reelection in recent history after a period of economic downturn,” Sandhill points out.

Biden hasn’t officially clinched the Democratic presidential nomination yet. But that seems inevitable, barring an unforeseen turn in the race. He handily leads Bernie Sanders in the delegate count, and Sanders himself seems to be tacitly acknowledging his inevitable dropout.

Recessions are funny things, because economists only declare them months after they start. And the formal definition of a recession is two consecutive quarters of shrinking GDP, which hasn’t happened yet. Real GDP, adjusted for inflation, grew 2.3% in the last quarter of 2019, and it’s running around 1.6% in the current quarter. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said “I don’t think so” when asked on March 15 if the U.S. economy is in a recession.

But the coronavirus is causing an abrupt economic shock that some economists think is more unnerving than the 2008 financial crash, which caused the worst downturn since the Great Depression. Widespread closures and cancelations seem certain to lead to losses and layoffs, already reflected in a stock market down 28% in less than a month. A manufacturing survey hit its lowest level since 2009 on March 16, a sign of the carnage to come. “This feels much worse than 2008,” Harvard economist Jason Furman, who worked in the Obama White House, told Vox recently.

Since the coronavirus crisis is a single-issue shock—due entirely to a known unknown—it’s possible markets and the economy will bounce back sharply once the crisis is over. But nobody knows when it will end, and the economic damage will compound as businesses lose revenue and struggle to pay rent and other bills. Some will default on loans and go under. The recovery will come too late for some.

Congress is poised to pass one stimulus bill this week, and possibly a larger one soon. If structured correctly, it will help. Still, for all its durability, the U.S. economy is heavily dependent on consumer spending, which accounts for roughly 70% of all activity. And that spending is plunging as people stay home and retailers close.