To quote the great philosopher Yogi Berra: “It’s deja vu all over again.”

Back in 2017, the headlines were full of predictions of an epic economic crash. Trump would deliver a second Great Depression, so best to jump off the ledge right now.

Of course, in Trump’s first term the stock indices rose between 50% and 100% and incomes after inflation for median families rose by roughly $6,000.

So here we go again. At the starting of this year it was more doom and gloom:

This headline from the front page of the Wall Street Journal in April shows that the “expert” economists almost all were pessimistic. The chart below shows about half were predicting recession by the end of the year:

Even as the economy improved dramatically after a bad first quarter of 2025, pessimism was pervasive:

“In the past three months, economists have changed their outlook for the U.S. to slower growth, higher inflation and greater risk of recession.”

Instead, we’ve had two quarters of near 4% growth and record highs on the stock market.

We believe that the tariffs have knocked off as much as one-half percent growth, but the tax cuts, the energy policies and the deregulation have added at least one to two percentage points to potential growth.

Can someone please tell Jerome Powell and the media?

First quarter GDP -0.6%

Second quarter GDP 3.8%

Third quarter GDP  3.8% (Atlanta Fed GDPNow)

Notice in the chart below from the Atlanta Fed that the economy has consistently outperformed expectations so far this year.