The system in the US is capable of running on nothing but hope because of the availability of lending and investment. "Unfortunately" that means the average person won't receive an impossible to ignore signal that something is going bad until bankers and investors lose hope. By that point, something would have had to have happened that can't be fixed in the short term by a reversal or a sudden period of sobriety.

For a concrete example, the stock market is going up and down every time the tariff threats change tone, but the layoffs that the tariffs will make inevitable won't be done until companies run out of financiers who can be convinced the setbacks are only temporary.