December is traditionally a time for forecasters to take stock of the year that was; celebrate the good calls, more commonly account for the bad ones and sharpen our focus on what it all means for the years ahead.
At EDC Economics, we’re proud to have not been lured by team recession, but acknowledge having overweighted our downside scenario, perhaps scarred by recent history and the unending parade of “unprecedented” events. But to the very end, the global economy defied prognostications of its imminent demise, thanks to a resilient U.S. consumer, the post-reopening normalization of activity in China, and an unusually warm winter in Europe.
Now, the long-awaited easing of global supply chains, which gained momentum over the course of this year, has helped prices for fertilizers, crude oil, natural gas, and food settle back down to 2021 levels, before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. In addition to that, labour markets across several key economies began loosening through the summer, and unemployment rates have inched up, including in Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, France, and China, dampening wage growth.
Learn more here: https://www.edc.ca/en/trade-matters/edc-risks-we-face-2024.html
