by Charles Hugh Smith
Of Two Minds
So what are conventional pundits missing today? I would start with three dynamics.
Only old people experienced real recessions–those in 1973-74 and 1980-82. Recessions since then have been shorter and less systemic.
In the good old days, a recession laid waste to entire industries which never recovered their previous employment. People who were laid off couldn’t find another job. Major sectors of the economy dried up and blew away. Jobs were scarce and there was an oversupply of people looking for work.
We’re told consumer confidence is in the dumps and everyone expects the worst: recession! Oh Lordy. Interestingly, there isn’t much evidence of this near-panic behaviorally. Everyone’s tightening their belts and battening down the hatches, but it’s not the cliff-dive we see in a real recession.