Anthony Scaramucci thinks economic pain isn't coming for the US. It's already here.
The former White House communications director added his voice to calls from prominent economists such as Mark Zandi, who have raised concerns about a recession recently, highlighting the fragile state of the economy and the impact of Donald Trump's policies.
"If you're asking me, 'Are we currently in a recession?' I believe, after 37 years on Wall Street, that we already are in one," he told Business Insider in an interview this week.
Since his time in the White House during Trump's first term, Scaramucci has been hosting and appearing on podcasts, weighing in on markets and the broader economy, particularly as they relate to Trump's policies.
Scaramucci said that he thinks the decision to impose a military blockade on the Strait of Hormuz is the right one, but he also revealed several reasons he believes Trump's policies have likely pushed the US economy into the jaws of a recession.
"If you just look at the data for lower and middle income people, [that group] more or less has to stop spending," he said. "And you can get a food shock due to lack of fertilizer, you get a further energy shock."
Scaramucci added that Trump has put the country through "16 months of drama," which has led to rising prices due to high tariffs or the energy crisis stemming from the Iran war. He also doesn't believe the war will end soon, even as Wall Street rallies on the prospect of a near-term conclusion of hostilities.
He said that the latest economic data is lagging the reality on the ground, predicting that future numbers will show that the US economy has experienced no growth for two consecutive quarters since the year started, meeting the technical definition of a recession. That said, the downturn might not be confirmed for months.
"The data is going to come out and [it's] going to tell you that we're in a recession," he said. "Sometime, when they're revising the April-May numbers in October, they'll tell you that we slipped into a recession,"
