YELLEN DOWNPLAYS RECESSION RISK

“There’s nothing to suggest a recession is in the works” for the U.S. economy, treasury secretary Janet Yellen said in an interview during last week’s New York Times economic forum.

“Of course there’s a recession risk,” she added, “but is it likely? I don’t think so.”

Yellen tried to buffer increasing pessimism about the economy’s future amid 40-year record inflation, rising interest rates, a sagging global economy, and uncertainties hovering over the Ukraine war and Western sanctions against Russia.

“I believe there is a path through this that entails a soft landing,” Yellen said.

The U.S. Federal Reserve has begun a program of interest rate increases throughout this year in an attempt to reduce inflation without triggering a recession—a so-called “soft landing.”

Inflation edged up to 8.6 percent in May from 8.5 in April, busting analysts’ hopes that the rise in prices had eased back to 8.3 percent last month.

TRENDPOST: Believe Janet Yellen? The motto of the Trends Journal is “Think for Yourself.” 

We had long ago forecast stronger inflation in articles such as our Economic and Markets Overview sections in our 27 October, 2020 and 3 November, 2020 issues and documented it through last year in our Markets Overview section on 18 May, 2021, 18 May, 2021, in “Inflation Spreads” (12 Oct 2021) and “Inflation on the Rise” (7 Dec 2021), among a host of other articles.

However, Yellen continued to echo Powell’s assertions of “disinflationary pressures around the globe” early last year, then for several months parroted his assertion that high inflation is “temporary,” then “transitory.”

Like the Fed itself, which she once chaired, Yellen has lost all credibility as an economic seer.