Most likely, the U.S. Congress will come to its senses long enough to find a compromise solution that enables the U.S. economy to avoid careening over a looming “fiscal cliff” and sliding into a double-dip recession in 2013, a leading financial astrologer predicts.

Grace K. Morris, MA, is editor of the Astro Economics Stock Market Newsletter.

“The ‘fiscal cliff‘ is a term used to describe a bundle of momentous U.S. federal tax increases and spending cuts that are due to automatically take effect at the end of 2012 or early 2013 if Congress fails to reach agreement on a combination of revenue hikes and spending cuts,” she explains.

If agreement isn’t reached, automatic tax hikes and budget cuts will slash about $503 billion from the federal budget for the 2013 fiscal year.

“Economists inside and outside the government have warned that such significant budgetary austerity in the midst of a still-fragile economic recovery could lead to a double-dip recession and rising unemployment in 2013,” she says.

While there’s no telling what actions a polarized and contentious Congress might take, Morris thinks there are reasons to be optimistic a deal will be struck.

For one thing, a double-dip recession is not the outcome predicted by an 18.6-year cyclical pattern that has reliably called economic recessions and recovery periods for more than a century – including the prediction that 2008 would mark the low point for the current cycle, she says.

Morris says the highly researched 18.6-year cycle first described by financial astrologer Louise McWhirter in 1935 is based on transiting lunar nodes. The mathematically calculated lunar nodes are sensitive points in space where the moon’s orbit around the earth intersects the earth’s orbit around the sun – the ecliptic.

The north or ascending node is where the moon’s orbit crosses north of the ecliptic. The descending or south node is where it crosses the ecliptic to the south.

Moving in a clockwise direction, it takes the nodes 18.6 years to travel through the 12 astrological signs.

“According to McWhirter’s theory, at this point the north node is in the sign of Scorpio and the U.S. economy should be starting an upward trend that will reach its peak in 2017. A double-dip recession doesn’t fit a pattern that has predictably tracked economic ups and downs for more than a century,” Morris said.

For those looking for other reasons to remain optimistic, the planet Jupiter will enter the sign of Cancer in June of next year and remain in the sign until July 16, 2014.

“This is significant because archetypal Jupiter is the planet of expansion and Cancer the sign symbolically linked with home building and real estate. An improving housing market should help the economy continue to grow.

“We’re also repeating a previous 14-year Neptune cycle (1956 – 1970) when low interest rates and low inflation helped the economy grow in the post World War II era,” she said.