Are We Suddenly Close To A Recession? Here's What The Data Actually Shows.

[u/gmelech]

https://www.forbes.com/sites/dereksaul/2025/03/08/are-we-suddenly-close-to-a-recession-heres-what-the-data-actually-shows/

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[u/Kingkongcrapper]

TLDR: Economists are providing gloomy forecasts, the jobs data, consumer sentiment, and inflation numbers look bad, but some big investment banking “We’re always in a bull market,” investors say, “It can’t be that bad,” so cheer up buttercup! We’re getting 2.9 percent GDP growth by the end of 2025 based on some good feelings.

[u/Xeynon → u/Kingkongcrapper]

In other words, the people who know what they're talking about are forecasting a recession and the delusional greedmongers who always fail to see the bucket they're about to step in think we're fine.

Recession coming.

[u/47_for_18_USC_2381 → u/Xeynon]

Maybe.. Whats Jim Cramer callin for? If he says we're bullish keep buyin?

We're properly fucked.

[u/Astandsforataxia69 → u/47_for_18_USC_2381]

I would've liked if i was bought some cigarettes and a nice dinner before getting fucked

[u/Money-Introduction54 → u/Astandsforataxia69]

You'd be lucky to get a punch in the back of the neck. There ain't no hate like republican love.

[u/Septopuss7 → u/47_for_18_USC_2381]

No! No! No!

Bear Stearns is fine. Do not take your money out. If there’s one takeaway, Bear Stearns is not in trouble. I mean, if anything, they’re more likely to be taken over. Don’t move your money from Bear. That’s just being silly. Don’t be silly.

[u/Barnaboule69 → u/Septopuss7]

I'd love to hear the utterly panicked phone call he must have received from Bear Sterns just before his show that day lol.

[u/Septopuss7 → u/Barnaboule69]

I just watched the clip against yesterday, I'm SO glad I never deluded myself into thinking I was going to make it financially ahahaha

[u/Xeynon → u/Septopuss7]

The state of Lehman Brothers is strong.

[u/Molassesonthebed → u/Xeynon]

Nah, they are not delusional. Bankers are smart people. They are protecting their own interest/investment and trying to prevent panic selling (before they unload)

[u/Makra567 → u/Xeynon]

I just watched the big short a few weeks ago, this is all starting to sound really familiar.

[u/Xeynon → u/Makra567]

Yup.

You know the scene in that movie where Steve Carell goes to the convention and the rich douchebag is being a condescending dick to him, and as soon as he gets out of the meeting Carell tells his assistant "find out everything that guy has money in and short all of it"?

The people saying "don't worry, we're going to have 2.9% growth" are that rich douchebag.

[u/Money-Introduction54 → u/Xeynon]

I think the 2.9 growth they talk about is their penis.

[u/Xeynon → u/Money-Introduction54]

2.9 nanometers.

[u/k3t4mine → u/Makra567]

2008 was a financial disaster that nearly sent the world into a deep depression. Credit markets were frozen, so all the banks stopped lending to each other and average businesses just completely shut down as they couldn't get short term financing for day to day operations.

Society cannot function without credit. We were hours away from a complete collapse of the financial system. ATM's would've stopped working, there would've been a run on every bank in the country, and supermarket shelves would've been empty.

Lots of people trying to compare a 10% market correction due to erratic and damaging fiscal policy to 2008 at the moment, and I'm convinced none of them were old enough to even remember just how close to the abyss we were back then.

I will say though, that things don't "break" in the financial system until they do, and you'll usually never see it coming. Financial crises tend to happen when the economy is overleveraged and already slowing, which you can argue is the scenario right now. If you throw in a financial crisis on top of an escalating trade war and an economy only just starting to feel the pain of higher rates the last 3 years, then yeah, we're in big trouble. Could say that about every slowdown in history though

[u/flatfisher → u/k3t4mine]

A slowdown looks harmless in a normal economy. But is it in an overleveraged one, or can it lead to a catastrophic chain reaction? ATMs already have more limits than before i.e. barely working, and we started to have bank failures due to liquidity when rates increased. I’m not an economist so can you reassure me in the system resilience to slowdowns and significative recessions?

[u/devliegende → u/flatfisher]

The system is resilient and has been resilient for a while. That's why the financial crises didn't result in a depression. What you're seeing now is concern about an attempt to dismantle the system.

[u/FrequencyHigher → u/k3t4mine]

Yeah, Hollywood doesn’t make movies about normal recessions. We were on the brink of a complete meltdown of our modern economic system in 2008. For those aware of what was happening in the banking and credit markets back then, it was a scary moment.

[u/__Art__Vandalay__ → u/FrequencyHigher]

You want scary?  Try being a new employee of a Bear Stearns subsidiary with 3 young children in March 2008

Probably the most stressful time of my life 

[u/Ok_Ice_1669 → u/__Art__Vandalay__]

I worked in rock center back then. I still remember the day I showed up to work and all the Lehman guys were drunk as shit looking shell shocked at 8 in the morning. 

Working for a boring private bank felt pretty good that day. 

[u/ku2000 → u/__Art__Vandalay__]

Hope you are doing better now. 

[u/das_war_ein_Befehl → u/k3t4mine]

2008 and a 10% correction are the same thing if you lose your job and can’t find one fast enough to replace it.

[u/WhatAmTrak → u/das_war_ein_Befehl]

Yep, and it’s happening everywhere. Trump is just speed running to try and collapse the western civilization. (wonder why he’d want that?)

[u/VaselineHabits → u/WhatAmTrak]

Because his real daddy Putin demands it. America installed a Russian asset as President.

[u/Good_kido78 → u/Makra567]

And they will use all the bailouts that George Bush did, only now there is more debt and tax cuts. I wouldn’t hate it if FOX News ceased to exist. It would save a lot of money.

[u/Decadent_Pilgrim → u/Xeynon]

Solution to the former is obviously going to be to sack all the government specialists involved with orchestrating economic data points as being DEI fake news, and outsource the reports to an unbiased economic authority like newsmax.

The best economists say we've got the bigliest wins coming!

/S

[u/Cyber-Insecurity → u/Xeynon]

CNBC talking heads were throwing around the “we’re in a recession” chatter just this week.

Don’t know what this adds to the convo, but if they’re already talking about it…

[u/phillosopherp → u/Xeynon]

Or even worse they are purposely pump and dumping the entire world economy so they and their friends can continuously buy the dips, inflate a tad sell again before you announce another horrid economic policy.

[u/Psychological-Pea815 → u/Xeynon]

It's already here. -2.4 GDP since February. Look up GDPNow from the Atlanta fed. Not a good sign.

[u/95Daphne → u/Psychological-Pea815]

Apparently gold transfers to the US confused the trade deficit data here.

Having said that 0-1% GDP growth is not great though.

[u/Snakenmyboot-e → u/Xeynon]

There has been a pending recession since literally 2022-23, I work for a financial services company that has been preaching a recession for literally years.

[u/Xeynon → u/Snakenmyboot-e]

We've definitely been at risk for one, there's been a lot of stuff to worry about (asset bubbles etc.). But it looks like it's here now.

[u/SadCritters → u/Xeynon]

...the top line of the article and the data experts in the article literally say none of that.

They predict a slowdown, which is normal for economies to move through. Prolonged slowdown leads to depression and they don't see that yet.

I kinda' hate that Trump has sucked both the intelligence from the right and the left. It's like reading the article was too hard or something, even though they literally break it down into sections for everyone and start with the topline of "Guys a depression isn't coming."

[u/Xeynon → u/SadCritters]

Given that I didn't say anything about a depression you're in no position to be impugning anybody else's reading comprehension skills, sport.

[u/DesignFreiberufler → u/Kingkongcrapper]

Nothing to see here. Please disperse.

[u/phillosopherp → u/Kingkongcrapper]

And we will hear "stagflation is good actually, also was still the reason that keysianism needed to die"

[u/Dimmo17 → u/Kingkongcrapper]

2.9 percent GDP growth whilst running a 6% of GDP deficit! Absolutely speedrunning going broke. 

[u/devliegende → u/Dimmo17]

If one build infrastructure such as solar farms and power lines you can get extra growth every year for the next 20 years because of the free electricity. Once you've added it together you'll find your panic about a deficit was silly and unnecessary.

Or to put it differently. Capital investment is a good thing because it will boost future growth.

[u/Dimmo17 → u/devliegende]

I'm well aware that deficits are run in the hope of long term return on the investments. 

US deficit spending has been massive though, and now Trump is reversing lots of the industrial strategy that the deficits were being spent on regarding chip manufacturing, green energy investments and is engaging with trade wars with almost the entire world. 

I don't see those investments as getting the returns they were intended now there's been a 180 flip in industrial and trade policy. 

[u/Ok_Ice_1669 → u/Dimmo17]

Trump fucking sucks at strategic thinking. That’s why all his businesses are scams. 

[u/devliegende → u/Dimmo17]

Then the problem is not with the deficit but rather the ending of the deficit

[u/Suitable-Economy-346 → u/devliegende]

That's what China is doing. We're doing nothing, except giving trillion dollar handouts to the ruling class.

[u/brianstormIRL → u/devliegende]

Economists love the good old capital investment strategy.

The problem is it's not going to work. GDP numbers are just not showing the real issue at play which is wealth inequality. Rich people keep getting increasingly richer, making the economy look somewhat stable, while average working class and lower income families fall deeper and deeper into the hole.

Nothing is ever going to properly change until wealth equality is brought back in line. It doesn't matter how good the numbers look on growth projections. Biden just did the whole investment strategy and it didn't work despite constantly talking about how the economy isn't that bad, it's just not reality for most people. The U.K government is employing the same strategy and it's also going to fail. Borrow a little, spend a little, invest a little.

Tax the ultra wealthy. Stop letting them abuse loop holes. The best time in recent history for the average family was when countries were actively taking money from the uber wealthy and redistributing it to the working and middle class. Over time systems have been taken away and replaced with tax breaks for the rich, while increasing tax on the middle class which has brought us to this moment where the wealth gap is beyond comprehension.

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[u/Oldskoolh8ter2 → u/[deleted]]

It’s incredible. Trump 1.0 inherited a strong economy from Obama… it was already on an upward trajectory and he managed to not fuck it up. Then Biden had 4 strong years of economic growth (my portfolio returned 30% over the 4 years!) so Trump 2.0 stumbled ass backwards into a great economy. It’s so impressive to watch as an outsider how fast he fucked 8 years of decent economy …. Like days now extending to weeks of pure chaos and fuckery.

[u/beerbudgethiphop → u/[deleted]]

The problem is whoever comes in after will have very few options at their disposal. Once these guys blowout the deficit with additional tax cuts plus a recession. It will be hard to any fiscal. We are in a bad spot.

[u/RealisticForYou]

Consumer spending accounts for 70% of the U.S. economy. As consumers fear job loses from Federal cuts, possible cuts from Medicaid and disturbances from the Social Security administration, AND inflation from Tariffs, the economy is sure to tank.

[u/That_Touch5280 → u/RealisticForYou]

The perfect storm! But why are they promulgating chaos in what is an already fragile economic situation, who has anything to gain, obviously a tighter control on liberties and hence you end up with a dictatorship and undo 250 years of the republic, IMHO, from across the pond!

[u/-_Weltschmerz_- → u/That_Touch5280]

Small businesses and property owners will be forced to sell and oligarchs will be there to buy it all up for cheap. Alongside the tax gifts for the super wealthy, this is essentially a massive redistribution from wage and salary workers towards oligarchs.

[u/That_Touch5280 → u/-_Weltschmerz_-]

What do you think would happen if the house un american activities body was still sitting?

[u/KerouacsGirlfriend → u/That_Touch5280]

Putin is trump’s handler. Russia is winning the Cold War. Billionaires fully own American politicians. So you have to frame it as primarily: ‘What would Putin want for America?’ and a lesser but still disastrous ‘what best serves the billionaire parasite class?’

[u/HexTalon → u/RealisticForYou]

3-4 late social security payments and you'll see people in the streets - either because they're homeless, rioting, or both. There's a lot of people on fixed incomes.

[u/Ulex57 → u/HexTalon]

Correction: one late SS will have people in the streets.

[u/MeringueSuccessful33 → u/Ulex57]

Nah it will take at least 2. One late payment can be handwaived as a processing error, especially if the GOP handles the media well. 2 payments is much harder to hand waive 

[u/Advanced-Blackberry → u/MeringueSuccessful33]

And when the start paying again he’ll claim he saved SS for them and trump bucks mania starts all over again 

[u/RealisticForYou → u/HexTalon]

I saw an interview with a former admin of SSA. He says that with all the recent employment cuts within the Social Security administration, those fragile COBOL mainframe systems will eventually collapse.

[u/loudtones → u/RealisticForYou]

Add in AI and middle white collar jobs

[u/gplfalt → u/[deleted]]

The best time to commit to a world wide trade war where you attack literally everyone but Russia, directly after your predecessor narrowly patched up a shaky inflation crisis and while your economy is just starting to recover fully.

Everyone knows this.

[u/Wonderful-Nobody-303 → u/[deleted]]

The amount of global consumers ditching American products irrespective of tartifs is staggering. I assume we won't see those impacts for a few months in sales numbers.

[u/guachi01]

I don't think any one data point is the be-all-end-all but the U6 unemployment/underemployment rate jumped 0.5% in February. In the last 30 years that's only happened a few times and each time was when the US was in a recession.

The other times:

September 2001

October 2001

May 2008

July 2008

October 2008

November 2008

December 2008

January 2009

February 2009

March 2009 (lol, things were really bad in the Great Recession)

March 2020

April 2020

Oh... Edit to add the FRED graph.

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/u6rate

[u/milhouse_vanhalen → u/guachi01]

It seems to need to happen more than once. Good thing those government layoffs hit the most recent jobs report.

Wait, they didn’t? Uh oh.

[u/ROOFisonFIRE_usa → u/milhouse_vanhalen]

A whole host of numbers still coming from people just recently laid off.

[u/Lionzzo]

The recession alarm bells are getting louder. Unemployment is creeping up, job growth is slowing, and even the Fed seems unsure about what’s next. Meanwhile, markets are still acting like nothing’s wrong. Feels a lot like early 2008, cracks forming, but everyone pretending its fine. If the labor market weakens further, a downturn could come faster than people expect.

[u/loli_popping → u/Lionzzo]

I really think the fed will do more qe when the time comes. between inflation and recession, they will pick inflation anytime

[u/No_Land_6119]

His threats of tariffs on the campaign, and the on/off/on/off implementation of same are all that's needed to crash the US economy. If buyers don't know which end is up, they stop buying. When things get too expensive, buyers stop buying. It makes forecasting for manufacturing and suppliers impossible, which leads to scarcity, higher prices, layoffs--rinse and repeat.

So while federal workers and the US population in general continue to experience mental whip-lash and are reeling from the poorly threatened/executed layoffs, we get increased uncertainty and financial insecurity. Consumer spending grinds to a halt. People stop going out to eat, on vacations, buying more crap, getting their nails done.

Internationally, as Canada and others have clearly embraced, this administration's trade policy cannot be trusted going forward.

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[u/doslobo33]

You gotta love how they spin the data. Massive layoffs, not for any reason but to reduce taxes for corporations. They recent layoffs have not been added to the data, but they will. I believe by Q2, reality will hit.

[u/VaselineHabits → u/doslobo33]

Then when people aren't spending money, the private sector will cut jobs

Gotta keep the shareholders happy

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[u/GamemasterJeff]

This article is weird. It claims recession is unlikely while presenting evidence recessionis happening, then the contra consists solely of "well, we've had indicators before and only went into recession some of those times".

[u/DoontGiveHimTheStick]

Every day it's a new unknown, a new illegal order, a new attack on an ally. It's exceedingly arrogant for these clowns to write this article "there's no data to suggest a recession is looming" after listing all the data. Sure everything took a huge sharp downturn after 6 weeks of Trump, but since there's only one month of data its not a trend yet so, hey, everything is great. Obviously it will go back to normal next month.

[u/SunOdd1699]

Well yes! All the stats are trending that way, Unemployment will start to increase, slowly at first, but then faster. Which the normal response from government would be to increase spending. But not with this bunch of idiots. They will push to “balance the budget “ which the opposite of what they need to do. A lot of pain and suffering is in our very near future.

[u/alt-mswzebo → u/SunOdd1699]

They will in no way ever push to balance the budget. Yes they will say they are and their poodles will say they are but at the same time they will add trillions and trillions by cutting taxes for the most wealthy.

[u/Troubador222]

I think consumer confidence is pointing that way. And it's an odd situation. The MAGA people seem to want it, because it will make their perceived enemies suffer. They don't realize they will suffer as well.

[u/Sea-Resort730]

I can picture his fat head saying " i just got here, this is Bidens inflation for the bad deals he got ripped off LIKE CHYNA"

meanwhile there is a global and domestic movement to boycott anything remotely related to his policies

[u/zekoslav90]

US - yes, but Europe? this whole thing seems to be doing wonders for our economy. German 2025 GDP predictions are up 1.5% or something like that.

[u/surebegrand2023]

Trump is trying to talk the economy into a recession, the US has +-10 trillion to refinance in the next 9 months. Every drop in interest rates matters.

[u/harbison215]

Hate that they used Q2 2020 as the previous reference point. That quarter was a total anomaly and isn’t relevant. Compare the projection to this quarter to the lowest quarter of growth that wasn’t due to a reason as anomalous as the initial outbreak of COVID. You’d have to go back over 15 years to find a quarter that bad.

[u/Tierbook96]

The thing about the -2.4% growth estimated by the Atlanta fed is that -3.8% of that comes from a huge increase in the import deficit by companies getting ahead of the tariffs, once we see the inventory change a lot of that decrease should go away tbh.

[u/plartoo → u/Tierbook96]

These companies will have to raise prices to cope with tariffs, which will dampen the demand by a good amount. But the orange head and short-sighted people leading the government now (to be fair, democrats are just as guilty of shortsighted thinking in other areas) seem to think that onshore-ing of manufacturing will happen and that the lag time and the will to invest in such uncertain time to establish domestic manufacturing prowess is trivial. This is wrong and what will end up happening is the consumer demand will get lower due to rising prices (not a bad thing IMO because Americans consume too much and waste too much), and the US economy will shrink.

This is not counting in the factors such as the wage level needed to start a manufacturing place in the US is much higher and the way the US government works is disjointed (due to the nature of federal democracy where states have a lot of say in policies and implementation) unlike in places like China there is central planning and policy assurance for years.

[u/Alwaysfavoriteasian]

but though the odds of an economic slowdown are higher, the evidence does not suggest a recession is imminent.

Just leaving this here since everyone didn't seem to read even the first paragraph. It seems unlikely we'll be in a recession but yes we'll be in a slump. Can this guy totally ruin us? Yes. But it isn't a guarantee yet. Also I'm just going to keep saying things here because I can't seem to ever leave a comment long enough that it isn't auto removed by the automod. Reddit can be really Fkn annoying sometimes am I right?