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Leah Valencia, University of New Mexico-Talk Radio News Service

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke announced the end of the recession Tuesday, but conceded that the U.S. will continue to feel its effects.

“From a technical perspective, the recession is very likely over at this point," he said. “[But] it is still going to feel like a very weak economy for some time,” said Bernanke during a speech at the Brookings Institute.

Bernanke warned that though the U.S. is leaving the recession behind, unemployment and low wages will continue to take their toll. He added that markets will remain weak through 2010, because economic growth will not be strong enough to create jobs.

“Unemployment will be slow to come down,” he said. “It will come down, but it may take some time.”

The bankruptcy of the Lehman Brothers occured exactly a year before Bernanke’s speech on Tuesday, marking the worst phase of the global financial crisis.

Bernanke said regulatory reform is needed to ensure that a crisis such as this does not reoccur.

“This has just been too big of a calamity and too serious of a problem.”

President Barack Obama delivered a similar message during a street to New York's financial community Monday.

While there has been some debate among policymakers over whether effective regulatory reform can make it through Congress, Bernanke remarked Tuesday that he was hopeful.

“I remain pretty optimistic that... reform will be forthcoming,” Bernanke said.