Here's the truth about a U.S. recession

Eric Winograd, Chief Economist, AllianceBernstein, reveals the real odds of a U.S. recession.

Transcript

00:00The last several recessions have not been business cycles driven recessions. One was the

00:04COVID pandemic, one was the financial crisis, one was the tech bubble bursting, one was the

00:10savings and loan crisis. You have to get all the way back to the 80s before we have sort of a

00:14typical recession. So it's not at all unusual that on the eve of a recession you would look at the

00:19data and think everything is more or less okay. When we look at the data right now you think

00:23everything is more or less okay. If you knew nothing else you would say that the odds of a

00:29recession on any 12 month period are about one in eight. One in every eight years is a recession.

00:34I think you have to observe the risk of that is probably somewhat higher right now given the

00:38policy volatility trade policy with monetary policy somewhat restrictive. Does that get it to you know

00:45I don't know 25 percent, 20 percent? Something like that seems reasonable. So higher than your

00:50you know normal probability but not so high that I think we should be losing sleep about it right now.