Javier Blas, Columnist

The Oil Market Needn’t Fear a Calamitous US Recession

A quick history lesson suggests that an economic slowdown might not be too terrible.

Things are looking cloudy.

Photographer: Brandon Bell/Getty Images North America
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Rising US interest rates, sky-high oil prices, soaring inflation, a foreign war. Then, naturally, a recession.

The trajectory may sound awfully familiar, but I’m not describing the present-day American economy. Instead, this is what the US looked like in early 1990. The commodity market now fears a repetition — with another cycle of rising interest rates, expensive oil and a disruptive military conflict leading to an economic slowdown.