Sir Niall Ferguson

And if it's costly for Americans, it's even more costly for their trading partners because the trading partners are by and large more exposed to trade.

So this is bad.

Hard to see any real upside to this.

At the same time, you've mentioned it,

The cuts that are happening in the federal government are going to have at least some impacts on the economy.

Unemployed people tend not to spend more money.

And then you've missed something out, which is really important, and that is the closing of the southern border.

Why did we not have a recession in 2023?

What happened to that?

All the economists predicted it.

It didn't happen.

Well, one reason it didn't happen was 6% of GDP deficit all the way.

The other reason is that 8 million people were added to the labor supply.

through illegal immigrants.

And that's over.

I mean, the southern border is essentially closed.

And so the positive labour supply shock has gone.

That will be a headwind to growth for sure.

On the other side, deregulation coming for sure.

No taxes going back up.