Economic growth finished within a respectable distance of President Trump’s 3 percent target to end 2017, with gross domestic product growth at 2.9 percent. But the start of 2018 isn’t looking as helpful for that talking point.
Staff for the Federal Reserve Bank of New York estimated Friday that first-quarter GDP growth will clock in at a 2.7 percent annual rate.
The New York Fed’s guess is optimistic relative to others.
The Atlanta Fed estimates in its latest forecast that growth will be 2.4 percent. When the regional bank forecast in February that GDP would come in at 5.4 percent, Republicans touted the number.
Private-sector forecasters see even lower growth. Deutsche Bank’s latest estimate is for 2.2 percent.
GDP growth rates bounce around significantly from quarter to quarter, and the Trump administration has said that its goal is sustained growth above 3 percent over the long run, not a big number in any one quarter.
Yet Trump has been quick to tout quarter-to-quarter numbers, too.
“ We’ve got the greatest economy, maybe, ever — maybe in history. We have the greatest economy we’ve ever had,” he said Thursday in a speech in Ohio.
He then referred to the most recent quarterly GDP numbers. If Democrats had won the election, he said, “your 3.2 GDPs and 3 and 2.9 would have been below — in my opinion, would have been below 1.”
While 3 percent growth has been the norm for much of recent history, economists expect slower growth to prevail in the years ahead because of slower population growth.
