A year ago, the vast majority of economists were warning that the 2023 economy would be haunted by the letter R, as in RECESSION. As it turns out, the letter was correct, the word, not so much. In retrospect, 2023 was a year of RESILIENCE for the U.S. economy, led by the pundit-defying labor market. Throughout the year, we were waiting for the U.S. economic engine to sputter, which would in turn cause employers to quickly shed positions. But miraculously, in the third year of a post-COVID expansion, the economy was able to produce an average of 225,000 jobs per month, for a total of 2.7 million. The year would have been considered…
