#51 – Rebecca Patterson, Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, on the “Jenga Tower Economy,” Policy Volatility, and What Could Shake Markets in 2025 (recorded 11/24/25)

In this episode, Rebecca Patterson, Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and former Chief Investment Strategist at Bridgewater Associates, and Former Chief Investment Officer at Bessemer Trust, joins Jim Worden and Talley Leger to break down one of the most complicated macro environments of our careers. Rebecca explains why the U.S. economy resembles a “Jenga tower”, still standing, still rising, but increasingly unstable. She discusses the widening divide between large and small businesses, the uneven health of U.S. consumers, the risk implications of delayed tariffs, and why global policy uncertainty could matter even more than Fed cuts in 2025.

She also dives into the dollar, gold, the future of immigration and demographics, and what AI-driven productivity might mean for long-term growth.

What you’ll learn

• Why Rebecca compares today’s economy to a “Jenga tower” with fewer supports
• The biggest risks to the 2025 outlook, including AI disappointment, Fed missteps, and wealthy consumer fatigue
• Why small businesses are weakening more than large companies and why it matters
• How global fiscal challenges (“the Fragile Four”) could reshape currency dynamics
• Why the dollar’s next move may be lower despite global turbulence
• How AI, demographics, geopolitics, and climate will shape the next decade
• What investors miss when they oversimplify tariffs and global trade flows
• Why diversification, not concentration, is the most important discipline heading into 2025

Chapters

02:00 — How Rebecca went from aspiring astronaut to journalist to global macro strategist

07:30 — The “Jenga tower economy”: strong on top, fragile underneath

12:00 — AI CapEx, wealthy consumer resilience, and what surprised markets in 2024

17:30 — What could cause the tower to wobble: labor trends, confidence, and policy volatility

23:00 — Tariffs, USMCA, and how global supply chains really work

28:00 — Dollar dynamics, the “Fragile Four,” and central bank gold buying

34:00 — Bitcoin, tech, and whether crypto selloffs can trigger equity contagion

41:00 — How macro frameworks evolve—and what doesn’t change

46:00 — Long-term themes: tech, demographics, geopolitics, and climate

51:00 — What investors should do now: diversify and avoid the panic trade

Guest: Rebecca Patterson - Senior Fellow, Council on Foreign Relations

Hosts: Talley Leger, Chief Market Strategist, WCG and Jim Worden, Chief Investment Officer, WCG

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