Although we are not fully recovered economically, with the unemployment rate at 3.9% it is now a decent time to take stock at how the COVID recession and its aftermath compares to previous recessions. The answer: the cumulative increase in unemployment was pretty typical. 
The unemployment rate rose sharply to 14.8% in April 2020 (higher if you count misclassified workers). But then it started falling sharply the next month. Adding up all of the cumulative increase relative to its pre-recession value it is 6.5 point-years of elevated unemployment.
That is much less than 20.5 point-years of elevated unemployment following the financial crisis and roughly typical for post-war recessions like what is generally considered the mild 2001 recession (where unemployment did not rise nearly as high but its elevation lasted longer).
In 2020 it was credible to worry about a second Great Depression. We avoided it. Partly due to the huge policy response (in part due to those warnings). Partly because COVID was more like a natural disaster that the economy quickly rebounds from.
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