Americans and Joe Biden can’t cartch a break….
Inflation off the pandemic and Ukraine conflict seems to be capped by a recession from the Fed going after thte Inflation and stucorness of coming back from the pandemic and high energy costs….
Things have ALREADY begun with firings and layoffs …..
This while other vbusiness’s are STILL looking for help….
(The labor force is different after Covid)
Go figure?
President Joe Biden says “there’s nothing inevitable” about a recession in the U.S.
He is an increasingly lonely voice about that prospect.
From Wall Street to Washington, whispers about a coming economic slump have risen to nearly a roar as the Federal Reserve ramps up its battle against the highest inflation in four decades.
Price spikes and the Fed’s aggressive interest rate hikes sent the benchmark S&P 500 stock index tumbling to its worst performance in the first half of the year since 1970. Consumer confidence has sunk to record lows. And economists are increasingly worried that a downturn will not only happen but happen soon — a danger underscored by one widely watched Fed growth tracker.
Fed Chair Jerome Powell has begun saying the quiet part out loud: The central bank is willing to tolerate a recession if it means getting inflation under control. “The bigger mistake to make,” he said on June 29, “would be to fail to restore price stability.”
While Biden has publicly backed Powell’s efforts, raising expectations of a recession are compounding the administration’s economic woes as Democrats head into congressional elections this year.
“Everyone is screaming about inflation,” said Josh Bivens, research director at the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute. But “people would really hate a recession too.”….
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Michael Feroli, the chief U.S. economist at JPMorgan Chase, said a downturn could even start as soon as this quarter, with recent data showing that consumer spending — the biggest driver of GDP — is beginning to slow.
“Things are looking like we’re losing altitude pretty quickly,” he said.
The government confirmed last week that the economy shrank in the first three months of the year — and the Atlanta Fed’s economic growth tracker is pointing to the increased chances of a second-quarter contraction…..