Compulsions can be hard to resist
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US: Recession or soft landing? Five reasons to be cautiously optimistic about 2023
Last year was dominated by scary headlines about crushing inflation, super-sized interest rate hikes and mounting recession fears. It was a brutal period for the stock market, with roughly one-fifth of the value of the S&P 500 vanishing and the Nasdaq dropping by more than one-third. All three major US markets suffered their worst years — by far — since 2008. And yet now that 2022 is over, there are clear bright spots in this economy that offer hope 2023 will not be the year the next recession begins. Hiring remains surprisingly resilient. The economy added a robust 263,000 jobs in November, and the ... (full story)