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Don't know about the late spring rebound, but from my perspective as a freelance mercenary, the downturn around November 2022 was very abrupt. Almost over night

Don't know about the late spring rebound, but from my perspective as a freelance mercenary, the downturn around November 2022 was very abrupt. Almost over night I went from fighting off work with a stick to absolute crickets. Not only that, but existing long-time clients who were historically easy to work with suddenly became very difficult and started to ask pointed questions about my output. I'm still struggling to find an explanation short of some cosmic shift in the collective unconscious.

hn_throwaway_99 3y ago
> I'm still struggling to find an explanation short of some cosmic shift in the collective unconscious. The end of free money and the rise in interest rates is essentially the root cause of all of this. Nov 2022 coincides exactly with when it became apparent that inflation wasn't just "transient" and the fed would need to keep rates high for an extended period to fight inflation. When that happens companies will pretty immediately pivot from a "grow at all costs" ethos to a "show your profits" mindset. Combine that with a general hangover from unrealistic, overly-hyped expectations during the pandemic ("people will spend every waking second online!!!"), and it makes sense that the change in sentiment was so abrupt.
- throwlikea 3y ago
  > Nov 2022 coincides exactly with when it became apparent that inflation wasn't just "transient" Have any sources on this I could check out? And yes, the pandemic was an absurd gold rush that was bound to crash at some point. It's just not clear to me that the cause was only about interest rates. Seems more like some confluence of chaotic factors.
  - hn_throwaway_99 3y ago
    Start with just a simple graph of the feds fund rate, https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/FEDFUNDS https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/FEDFUNDS. Rates were going up before then, but it's right about Sept/Oct when they reached a level that was a ~15 year high. Rates weren't the only factor (and, of course, the increase in rates was caused by the inflation that was a result of both supply shocks and the government paying people a lot of money to do nothing), but I think they were the prime factor as to why it felt like things switched on a dime so quickly, because it was the forcing function that essentially caused all projects that could no longer compete with 5% t-bills to immediately get killed.
    - throwlikea 3y ago
      Yeah you look to be right about Sep-Nov, wow. > government paying people a lot of money to do nothing And a lot of money to do something. I later found out that a lot of my initial Covid-era clients were paying me from PPP loans.

hn_throwaway_99 3y ago

> I'm still struggling to find an explanation short of some cosmic shift in the collective unconscious. The end of free money and the rise in interest rates is essentially the root cause of all of this. Nov 2022 coincides exactly with when it became apparent that inflation wasn't just "transient" and the fed would need to keep rates high for an extended period to fight inflation. When that happens companies will pretty immediately pivot from a "grow at all costs" ethos to a "show your profits" mindset. Combine that with a general hangover from unrealistic, overly-hyped expectations during the pandemic ("people will spend every waking second online!!!"), and it makes sense that the change in sentiment was so abrupt.

throwlikea 3y ago
> Nov 2022 coincides exactly with when it became apparent that inflation wasn't just "transient" Have any sources on this I could check out? And yes, the pandemic was an absurd gold rush that was bound to crash at some point. It's just not clear to me that the cause was only about interest rates. Seems more like some confluence of chaotic factors.
- hn_throwaway_99 3y ago
  Start with just a simple graph of the feds fund rate, https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/FEDFUNDS https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/FEDFUNDS. Rates were going up before then, but it's right about Sept/Oct when they reached a level that was a ~15 year high. Rates weren't the only factor (and, of course, the increase in rates was caused by the inflation that was a result of both supply shocks and the government paying people a lot of money to do nothing), but I think they were the prime factor as to why it felt like things switched on a dime so quickly, because it was the forcing function that essentially caused all projects that could no longer compete with 5% t-bills to immediately get killed.
  - throwlikea 3y ago
    Yeah you look to be right about Sep-Nov, wow. > government paying people a lot of money to do nothing And a lot of money to do something. I later found out that a lot of my initial Covid-era clients were paying me from PPP loans.