May 18, 2026

The below transcript is a translation of the podcast audio that has been machine generated by Adobe Podcast.

00:00 Derek Stanely The next four years we’re expecting general growth, so it’s easy for companies to fall into that trap of linear planning. But we’ve been talking about the 2030s being a much different scenario.

00:10 Taylor St. Germain Hi everyone. This is Taylor St. Germain with ITR economics. Thanks so much for joining me on this episode of TrendsTalk. We had ITR or your apolitical and unbiased source of economic intelligence in. Today we have a guest with us, my colleague Derek Stanley. He is an economist. He is one of our consultant speakers, and he’s the team leader of all of our public speakers. So he gets to deal with folks like me on an everyday basis.   We’ve got a lot of great content related to 2030 to discuss today, but Derek, thanks for, thanks for joining us.

00:41 Derek Stanely Yeah, thanks for having me on. I think this is a really important subject that we’re going to be talking about more and more over the next few years and   happy to provide some insights for our clients today.

00:51 Taylor St. Germain Absolutely. And folks, as many of you know from last week’s episode, we talked through the national debt and some of the drivers of the 2030 downturn, which still remained consistent with our messaging over the last few years. But today, Derek and I wanted to take more of an approach to how to prepare ourselves for this in the years leading up to it. As many of you know, we’re forecasting four consecutive years of GDP expansion leading up to the 2030 downturn. Many of our clients are recognizing that this isn’t that far away at this point, despite how long we’ve been talking about this. So we wanted to talk through some of those things. And I guess, Derek, I’ll just start by hitting you with an open ended question. What are the things that are most important that you want business owners, professionals to understand in terms of how best to prepare over these next few years to put themselves in a position to actually thrive during twenty thirty versus just being reactive to this.

01:50 Derek Stanely Most people know that we look at two key macro indicators here when we’re talking about the the broad picture. We’re talking about US industrial production. We’re talking about GDP. And until, like you said, the next four years we’re expecting general growth, so it’s easy for companies to fall into that trap of linear planning like, hey, look, we’re in this expansionary trend, you know, the horizons, you know, bright ahead of us. But we’ve been talking about the 2030s being a much different scenario. So yes, part of this objective is capturing the growth, but knowing that that runway isn’t endless, like for the next few years, we need to be looking at cost discipline. We need to be making sure margin growth keeps pace with top line growth. Top line growth might come easier when the macro economy expands. Your vertical markets are doing well. But as we approach the next decade, the companies that are going to succeed are the ones that are diversified into several markets that are resilient, ones that are in a strong cash position. They have, you know, diversified cash flows and really leverage, like lowering that debt level. Some debt’s okay, like it’s inevitable for us as consumers and businesses to carry some leverage throughout various cycles, but we need to be as mindful as we can about if we’re going to be able to pay down that debt and what level of labor capacity we’re going to need in the next decade. So all those things need to be front and center. They’re good bits of advice for any economic cycle, but especially the 2030s. The companies that are going to survive that and capitalize it once we’re at the bottom of that, that depression period, those are the ones that, you know, are going to take that advice to heart now and not just pretend like, you know, the sky is blue forever. Like there’s a storm coming, and you know, we need to take advantage of what’s ahead of us, but also prepare for what’s further down the line.

03:41 Taylor St. Germain Yeah. And I think that’s one of the challenges right now is, you know, there’s growth ahead of us. So everyone wants to be investing in this growth and expanding their business. But you need to keep your balance sheet in mind as we look at 2030. And I think that’s one of the keys that you touched on, which is we want a lot of cash and we want to be relatively debt free or low levels of debt, like you said, going into the 2030s and the decisions we make today are going to impact where we are in 2030. We’re only four years away from this. And folks, that’s, I think, something we really want you to be considering is the cash is king is always a phrase we use as economists, especially here at ITR and those businesses that build their cash reserves over the second half of this decade and pay down some of those levels of debt, are going to be the ones that are acquiring businesses, people, assets at a discount in the 2030s. So it’s a great time to be really growing your market share during one of these downturns. Now, Derek, you mentioned diversifying into industries and geographies even that might be more resilient. I guess, what are some of the industries that you’re looking at for 2030 that you think will be more resilient than others? And maybe expand on what you mean by resilient?

04:56 Derek Stanely Sure. I think I’ll talk about that second part first. When we say resilient, it doesn’t mean that these industries that I’m about to mention are immune from downturns, but they could be acyclical.  So when the macro economy goes through a downturn, they might be in a rising trend. But then after that they might see some contraction while the macro economy is in recovery mode. Just some examples though, the healthcare market, we know that we have aging demographics out there, so in various ways,   you know, the healthcare construction industry right now, for example, is doing fairly well, especially on the hospital side, while other non-res markets are not faring quite as well besides data centers, for example. So employment in the healthcare sector, we’ve looked at those trends historically, that has been generally strong over the course of economic downturns, ’08, back in the early 2000s, you know, just a few of those more recent examples.   Education employment, that can be tied more to, you know, estates finances, for example. Government emergency services, also the defense sector, we know that we have a record high   defense budget   potentially coming into the works by October when the government’s fiscal year begins. So people who have exposure at least have the ability to pivot that industry could potentially outperform   their current market. So that’s an area where, again, we have seen downturns there, but historically they just haven’t timed perfectly with industrial production or GDP.

06:31 Taylor St. Germain Yeah. So health care, education, defense, I would add to, just to that, you know, there’s two industries that I love talking to people about, food is another one I would add into Derek’s list.   Like Derek said, I’m not saying there won’t be a downturn in food in 2030, but because of the essential nature of food could likely be less severe of a downturn. And that’s something to consider in 2030 as well. We’re not saying every market’s going to grow and that you’ll be completely immune to a downturn. But if you can mitigate the downturn by expanding into some of these markets, it’s going to be helpful. So I’d add food to Derek’s list. I’d also add pets. Pets is fun. We love talking about pets because even during economic downturns, you tend to see folks are still spending on our pets. It’s one of the things I love about our country. We just continue to invest in our animals.

07:22 Derek Stanely I think I spend more money on my dog than I do on my two kids combined.

07:27 Taylor St. Germain Yeah, we’re, I think we’re guilty of that. I’m guilty of that too. So, you know, folks, it’s multiple approaches we want you to take of thinking about this growth. And the reason we highlight some of these industries is you can’t wait until 2030 to get into these industries. It’ll be too late by then. You need to start establishing your market share into some of these industries, you know, as we move forward here in the second half of the decade, because you want that established market share before 2030 ultimately upon us. And another way that the team and I at ITR are looking at 2030 is starting to really focus on some of the geographies within the US, what states will perform better than others. And we, we have a presentation coming up with our Managing Director Grace and our Senior Forecaster Connor. That’ll be in June, June 17th, 2026. And we’ll have a QR code and a link in, in the description here to where you can access that. But Connor and Grace will really be looking at the different states that are likely to outperform heading into the 2030s. You’ll have a better idea of how to align investments and expansion with the top performing regions here in the United States and learn, you’ll also learn how to avoid some of the underperforming high risk states as well. So I feel like, you know, Derek, the team and I, we’ve been talking about this 2030 downturn for so long and highlighting why it’s going to happen. But now our job is to bring solutions to all of you. And this presentation on June 17th it will really move into the to the geographic background around which areas are going to be the places to be. Do you have anything to add to that, Derek? Any thoughts there?

09:18 Derek Stanely Yeah. Look, in terms of geography, I know a while back, Brian did a presentation on like which countries were going to fare better, but I really think this one coming up, because we’re really focusing on the US market and how that’s going to perform during the 2030s and, and the recovery after, having a state by state approach is very important because we look at things like demographic trends, population growth trends, like, for example, Texas, Florida have benefited from strong population growth. Utah, a lot of other states in the western part of the country. But we, we dig even deeper, we look at the workforce in each of these states. How diversified is the workforce? If it’s like a heavy manufacturing workforce? Is that one, that state going to be more prone to hardship during the 2030s for example. We also look at, you know, the state’s finances because, you know, we know some states are very good at balancing their budget every year. Others might have a heavier burden in terms of unfunded pension liabilities, obligations and things like that.   Again, every state’s different, every state has its own unique circumstances, but knowing the state’s finances and how well they’re going to be able to manage a downturn is critical because we can help clients target which parts of the country are going to fare slightly better. Again, they might each state is going to go through some pain during that time, but it’s going to be much more pronounced in some areas versus others.

10:44 Taylor St. Germain Yeah, we’ve got to look at those states that have the big baby boomer populations, who’s attracting the millennials, who’s attracting the younger generations. There’s a lot to unpack. And again, Grace and Connor will do a great job in in June unpacking some of those trends. So folks, we’ve got a lot of great insight coming up, not just in the short term, but as we think about the longer term and how to prepare for the 2030s. So again, there’s a, there’ll be a QR code that links to that presentation in June. There’ll be a link in the description as well. And always feel free to find Derek or I on LinkedIn, ask any questions that you might have. But   for now, we’ve got growth out there in front of us still. Our thoughts haven’t changed on that despite the current events. But boy, it’s important that we take care of, take advantage of this growth leading up to the 2030s. So, Derek, thanks for being here. Thanks for joining us, we’ll look forward to having you on to talk more 2030s. And for everyone else, I hope you found this information helpful. Please like and subscribe to TrendsTalk wherever you listen to your podcasts. And we look forward to seeing you on the next one. Thanks so much. Take care for now.