The United States economy shrank at a yearly rate of 32.9 percent between April and June of this year. It is the worst quarterly contraction in the economy ever recorded. The contraction came as the coronavirus pandemic pushed struggling businesses to close for a second time in many parts of the country. The closures have left millions of Americans out of work. The U.S. Commerce Department released the economic numbers Thursday. Its estimate of the contraction in the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is the worst since the government began keeping such records in 1947. The decrease comes after a 5 percent drop in economic activity during the first three months of the year. That is when the economy officially entered a recession, ending 11 years of growth, the longest on record in the country.