If you listen to the mainstream media, we have avoided a recession under Biden and are now in the clear. It's an incredibly misleading claim since the United States was technically in a recession in the summer of 2022, but the Biden administration, borrowing a few ideas from George Orwell, simply redefined what a recession means to convince the public that we weren't in a recession.
Despite years of previously acknowledging that two consecutive quarters of negative growth is the accepted definition, the media was more than happy to help the Biden administration convince the public that there was no recession. Recent events point to a recession coming again this year, and some even say that a recession may already be here. Last week, we learned that the housing market experienced an overall decline, which Fannie Mae's chief economist noted is a major indicator of a looming recession.
However, according to Danielle DiMartino Booth, the chief strategist at QI Research, the U.S. economy already appears to be in a recession, citing the weak job market, the rise in layoffs, and massive debt spending as key indicators.
"The chief strategist of QI Research has warned for months that the US economy is already in a recession, despite Wall Street's upbeat outlook for a soft landing. But a downturn is already evident in the weakening job market, Booth said, pointing [to] recent downward revisions in monthly job growth figures," reports Business Insider.
For example, earlier this month, March reportedly saw 303,000 new jobs added — above expectations, but February's numbers were revised downward to 270,000 — and it was not the first time we've seen downward revisions. It seems likely that the 303,000 figure for March will be revised downward in the upcoming report on Friday. These downward revisions appear to reflect reports of mass layoffs in recent months.
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"I think what I'm seeing is the rearview mirror in the sense that we keep getting more revisions," she said. "The Bureau of Labor Statistics put one out a few days ago that showed that we've actually now got payrolls that have turned negative — contracting. But again, these are not the reports that you hear on 'Non-Farm Payroll Friday' when we all crowd around the data on ... those Friday mornings."
Booth noted that the revisions "keep pushing us further and further back from where we thought we were" and that the media is not covering this story. But perhaps even worse is the fact that she has lost faith in the government's reporting.
"It's very difficult for me to say that," she said. "I know that there are some great, wonderful, hardworking people, but, statistically speaking, some of these releases simply don't add up. But what we've seen in the month of April, which is a seasonally benign month for layoffs, typically — companies come out of the gate in January and that's the big month for layoffs — but we've actually seen the number of job-cut announcements out of corporate America surpass in April that which we saw in January, we're at 105,000 and counting. And it seems like every time companies report their earnings, they're doing it with a kicker that says, 'Hey, we're gonna lay off 2,000 people or 1,500 people,' whatever it is."
"It's just curious to me that what we're seeing on the ground is simply not reflected in the data," she added.It all seems to point to the Biden administration knowing that the economic situation is not as good as it is claiming, and this strategy of kicking the can down the road isn't likely to be effective forever.
