But Most People THINK We're in a Recession

Yesterday I wrote "Are We in a Recession?" noting that while a simplistic technical definition says yes, other significant factors say no. But a lot of ordinary people think we are. A recent CNN poll, for example, found that 64% think we're already in a recession. As business cycles are driven by expectations of the future, ultimately if people think we're in a recession then we are in a recession— or soon probably will be.

Okay, so why do people think we're in a recession?

I figure half of those saying we're in a recession now are the 1/3 of the country who get their news from Fox News, et. al. Conservative media have been screaming about economic collapse since... about January 6, 2021, when Congress acknowledged Joe Biden's victory in the Electoral College despite a conservative lynch mob whipped up by former president Donald Trump storming the Capitol. Morning, noon, and night they pound the table about how Democrat political leaders are villainous morons bent on destroying the US because they hate it. So of course people who get their world-view from the fever swamps think we're in a recession. They're also think we're in a socialist dictatorship led by a mentally incompetent man who stole the election through 10,000,000+ fraudulent votes.

What about the other half of the people who say we're in a recession now? Partly it's the knock-on effect of the conservative media fever swamps. When major media outlets like Fox scream that we're in a recession, other media feel compelled to cover the "story". They phrase it as a question— "Are we in a recession?"— and write stories to "cover the debate". But even asking the question, and repeating it in headlines daily, causes many people to assume the answer is yes. Or at least that "yes" is as likely an answer as "no".

It's interesting to note that the result from last week's opinion poll, "Are we in a recession?" is no different from results of similar polls three weeks ago— well before the Commerce Department's Thursday announcement that Q2 growth was -0.9%. So facts aren't changing many people's minds. Furthermore consider that the flip of the poll number, 36% who think we're not in a recession, is basically the same as President Joe Biden's approval number— which has been mired in the 30s for a year or more. So basically the recession question is just another front in the opinion war from political opponents on the right and those on the left they've frustrated by making the government dysfunctional.

Trade Show Day 2

Today was Day 2 at the trade show in Los Angeles. It went fine. ...Better than I expected actually.

The main metric we're judged on at trade shows is how many "leads" we get. A lead is a scan of someone's badge when they visit our booth. I believe this is not the best metric to track, but that's a) a longer story to explain, and b) something that nobody in charge thinks they should consider input from me on... even though I happen to be right.

Anyway, we got a goodly number of leads today at the booth. That's the basis on which I say it went better than expected. What I expected was a big dropoff in the number of new leads today vs. yesterday. That's because Day 2 is always slower than Day 1 and this Day 2 is a weekend. Would there be as many people here on a Saturday as there were on Friday? I could imagine it going either way. The answer was yes, there were a pretty decent number of attendees here, including a lot of people who didn't visit our booth yesterday. So we got a good number of scans— which makes this show a success in the eyes of our company execs even though it's the wrong metric for them to focus on.

While we had a decent number of new leads today we once again wrapped up early. Yesterday we wrapped by 5:45 even though the show officially ran 'til 6pm. Today the stated hour was 6 again but we wrapped at 5. Many other vendors were folding up their exhibits around the same time. A few had already left by 3.

Finishing early means the show is less grueling. Long days of standing on one's feet, on poured concrete floors, having repetitive conversations about, "So, what does your company do?" with people who largely don't care but are faking it just to get a free hat or insulated bottle, are tiresome... physically and mentally. So I'm happy we wrapped at 5. It means I can relax in my room for a bit before going out to dinner with my colleagues at a reasonable hour.

Tomorrow's a short day on the show floor, 10am-2pm. We'll see if it winds up being even shorter than that.