The inverted yield curve has predicted the past seven recessions, however many articles claim that the inverted yield curve cannot predict WHEN the recession will hit. The first thing I want to mention is how the title says "the father of the yield curve indicator". This is a way for authors to scare people who are reading the article because if the person who "invented" or "discovered" the yield curve indicator says that consumers and producers should start preparing, then it is credible. That does not imply that the father of the yield curve indicator is the most knowledgeable. That is simply a scare tactic.
The key points of the article mentions that Harvey encourages investors, business executives, and consumers to prepare now for the upcoming recession. However if businesses and consumers begin to prepare now for a recession, it would speed up the process for a recession to "hit". A recession occurs when there are two or more consecutive quarters of negative economic growth. However, if businesses start to prepare for a recession, they will most likely start to save their money instead of investing which decreases GDP. The same will happen to consumers except they will stop consuming as much which is a large contributing factor to GDP. I believe that preparing for a recession is not what people should be doing, but instead slowly saving money so that they will be okay in the future.
I like that you pointed out the title, it definitely sounds more intimidating. Given that we've seen a correlation between inverted yield curves and recessions, I would think it would be smart to start preparing for one. Yes it would slow down growth but it may not be as catastrophic when the recession actually hits. Another important thing to note is that the article talks about how there is no correlation between an inverted curve and an equity marked that underperformed government bonds- so it doesn't necessarily mean that stock prices will tank.
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