The economy goes through the phases of a cycle over time. Most of the time the economy is on a growing trajectory, however from time to time there comes a decline in economic activity called economic crisis or recession. The main macroeconomic indicator of the economic crisis is GDP, which must be negative for two consecutive quarters. The economic crisis due to the reduction of economic activity is most often manifested in the increase of government deficits due to the reduction of tax revenues, as increase in unemployment, but also changes in inflation. National economies are dealing with a recession in fiscal and monetary policy. This paper analyzes the last two economic crises, which had effects on the economies of individual countries and which measures (primarily fiscal) were used to overcome these recessions as successfully as possible. The first economic crisis analyzed in the paper is the global financial crisis in 2008 in the United States, the main cause of which was inadequate regulation of the financial sector, and the second crisis was caused by a pandemic that the world is still struggling with and has no origin in the economic world, but its significance is so strong that it has caused a decline in world economic activity not seen since World War II. The two economic crises had very different causes, but both had a strong impact on the decline of the global economy. During the financial crisis some countries were rather slow in adopting anti-recession measures, which resulted in an economic crisis that lasted, in some countries, for more than five years, with the arrival of the pandemic crisis, countries reacted quickly and almost equally and assumption is that the economic crisis will end as soon as the pandemic is contained.