Let’s Worry Ourselves Into Recession

Does it occur to anyone that persistent hand wringing over the potential for recession does as much to create the recession as anything else?
I first heard about recessions when I entered the world of financial services in 1980. Until then, economic reports were for me just a lot of babble about big numbers. None of meant anything and had no clear effect on my daily existence. Then for 20 or so of my nearly 30 years in the financial business, economic numbers were part of the fabric of my work life. We had endless discussions about recession, interest rates, the Fed, the Chairman of the Fed, Republicans or Democrats, the dollar, yen, euro, ruble and the employment/unemployment rate. After thoroughly vetting all of the above, we called our clients and made portfolio suggestions based on our interpretation of what had been discussed. Or we followed some formula of stocks, bonds and cash concocted by the firm's research department. We might have further endless discussion about which stocks, which industries, whether to have international exposure or no, and any specific corporate messyness and the anticipated duration until resolution. Then we thought about about what quality of bonds were appropriate, a lot of mumbo jumbo about the "spread to treasuries" and what maturity ranges to buy or sell.
All of it, every word, research report, conference call and meeting was completely useless as a practicality. The only thing it did was to supply gibberish to cover over our complete ignorance when we talked to clients. Every report, verbal or written was sprinkled with so many caveats, maybes and ifs, as to be pointless as a frame of reference.
If the client did nothing, or made only minor modifications, which was usually the case, it all worked out fine. If they made some wholesale allocation change, it was usually a disaster, first because it cost them a fair amount to uproot and repot all the money. Second, because the transplanted funds were no more wisely invested than they had been in the first place.
It’s true that the new portfolio might have performed better for a while than the original one. It is also true that it likely performed no better at all, or worse. What is absolutely true is that, 100% of the time, nobody ever knew the answer because once the portfolio was altered, no one tracked the performance of the original one.
It was, and is, a colossal joke. I got much better results for clients when, for the last part of my career, I actively ignored all the economic numbers and file 13'd any research reports that accidentally crept onto my desk. I have subsequently had discussions with broker friends who tell me they absolutely agree, then, honest to god, they e-mail me some guru's market babble two days later with a note, "this guy makes a lot of sense."
I finally noticed that, first, when the market goes up, any decently diversified basket of stocks goes up the same amount. Yes, there are spurts of small stocks, or international stocks, or sector bursts. In the end, it all evens out, and nobody has ever demonstrated any consistent capacity to pick the right time to get in or out of a sector, or an industry or whether to be in or out of the market at all.
Your brokerage firm just wants you to shuffle the money around. They really don’t care why you do it, just so you do it. If you don’t do it enough, your brokerage firm will supply you with loads of reports telling you why you should. Bear in mind, all the information they supply has already been factored into the price of your stock or bond, including all the anticipated information about your stock or bond. By definition, when you do that, you are selling or buying on useless information. It can’t be any other way. The only information that would be useful is information that you cannot know, that nobody can know. It is the unexpected. You can’t know the unexpected because it’s, well, unexpected.
Instead, we listen to talking heads and “analysts” telling us all about the impending signs of a recession, which frightens corporate pooh-bahs into hiding, laying off and cutting back. Eventually this turns into a slow growth or no growth situation which turns into a recession. Essentially, we talk ourselves into it.
I remember my first real job. I got it in 1973 or thereabouts. Unbeknownst to me, in the middle of a recession. I got a decent salary and a company car, benefits fully paid by the company. I proceeded to grow the sales of the products I was hired to sell, was subsequently promoted and promoted again. If I had known what a horrible recession I was in, I would have failed miserably.