What recession? Inflation, GDP offer hope for 'soft landing'

But what business managers, policymakers, investors and economists want to know is this: How cool would be cool enough for the inflation fighters at the Federal Reserve to begin to ease their aggressive interest rate hikes? The Fed is engaged in an epic battle to rein in inflation, which was running at a 40- year high in June and has eased only slightly since.

"It depends almost entirely on what the Federal Reserve does in the next three or four months," he explains. The Federal Reserve, which meets two more times this year, announced another significant increase in interest rates on Wednesday afternoon. The decline in U.S. Gross Domestic Product and real North Carolina GDP in the first and second quarters.