Last month?s jobs numbers were grim, and no one is feeling too sunny about U.S. economic prospects. But there were a few scattered signs of growth over the summer that showed an upturn from last year.
Contrary Indicator columnist Daniel Gross notes that auto and retail sales were both higher this August than in the previous year. GM, for instance, reported 18 percent higher sales, while the International Council of Shopping Centers said same-store sales rose by 4.6 percent. He continues:
The ISM manufacturing report, released on September 1, indicated that the goods sector of the economy was still expanding in August, although new orders slowed. The ISM services report, released yesterday, showed the vast services sector gained strength in August, with new orders rising. Macroeconomic Advisers, the non-partisan, highly trustworthy, reality-based forecasting firm, continually updates its projection for current quarter GDP growth based on new data coming in. The current estimate: the U.S. economy is expanding at an annual rate of about two percent. For those keeping score at home, that?s twice the rate of second quarter growth, and five times the rate of first quarter growth.
All this shouldn?t necessarily give cause to celebrate. As Gross points out, a two percent expansion might not even be enough to accommodate for the country?s growing population, meaning that it will still feel like the economy is contracting on the whole. (According to the Congressional Budget Office, the country needs 90,000 new jobs created per month to just keep pace with population growth.) But in the current context, a few green shoots are certainly better than none at all.
Source: http://feeds.washingtonpost.com/click.phdo?i=c8ab024b11d7af4bd6576223b4888411
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