Axios C-Suite: Why Kyla Scanlon is an influencer you should know
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Ask your employees how the economy feels right now and a decent number will answer with some version of "vibecession" — the idea that Americans feel broke even as the hard data says otherwise.
- That term didn't come from the Wall Street Journal, CNBC or a Davos panel. It originated in a 2022 Substack newsletter by Kyla Scanlon, then 25 years old.
Why you should care: Your young, high-potential employees are reading her, not the Journal, to understand what tariffs mean for their wallets and whether their jobs survive AI.
Think of her as a bridge between the language of the old guard of legacy media and terminally online meme consumers.
- She authored a New York Times opinion piece this week titled "Why the Stock Market Makes No Sense Right Now" that invokes the "Greenspan put" and the "taper tantrum."
- She talked about that same piece on Instagram in a post captioned: "I wish I also was free from the burden of reality like the US Stock Market, perhaps."
The bottom line: Anxiety around a "vibecession" remains very real, and it can change your employees' retention behavior, productivity and spending. Scanlon is the one giving that anxiety its vocabulary and legitimacy.
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