Posted on 02/26/2010 6:31:07 PM PST by NaturalBornConservative
More B.S. from D.C.
By: Larry Walker, Jr.
According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA's) second release regarding - the 4th quarter 2009 GDP, issued earlier today, GDP increased at an annual rate of 5.9% in the 4th quarter of 2009. That is the rate of increase from the 3rd to the 4th quarter, expressed as an annualized percentage rate. The BEA also stated that, in the 3rd quarter, real GDP increased 2.2%. Sounds good, right? Woo-hoo!
"Real gross domestic product -- the output of goods and services produced by labor and property located in the United States -- increased at an annual rate of 5.9 percent in the fourth quarter of 2009 (that is, from the third quarter to the fourth quarter) according to the "second" estimate released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. In the third quarter, real GDP increased 2.2 percent."
But if you read down a little further into the report, the part where the BEA re-enters the atmosphere, you will discover that real GDP fell by (2.4%) in 2009. That is the rate of decline from the 2008 level to the 2009 level. So, is this good, or bad?
[2009 GDP] "Real GDP decreased 2.4 percent in 2009 (that is, from the 2008 annual level to the 2009 annual level), in contrast to an increase of 0.4 percent in 2008."
Like I said in a previous post, it's like telling me that my IRA account grew at an annual rate of 5.9% in the 4th quarter, but when I look at my statement I find that my account balance has actually declined by (2.4%) from 2008. So am I better off? No. Are you?
The next time Obama & Company start boasting about 4th quarter 2009 GDP, I wish someone would stand up and say, "but, sir, GDP actually fell by 2.4% under your watch". Put that in your tea and drink it!
Reference:
http://www.bea.gov/newsreleases/national/gdp/gdpnewsrelease.htm
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It’s all in how you measure GDP. If you include bridges to nowhere, potato chip museums, the holes Obama paid to have dug and then filled in, and scientific studies concerning the sexual preferences of amoebae, then yes—the GDP did go up.
“...the holes Obama paid to have dug and then filled in...”
An American Taxpayer was driving home from from his annual trip to the city when he saw a couple of ‘0bama’ T-shirt-wearing youths planting trees by hand. As he had some extra time on his hands, he stopped to watch, but couldn’t believe his eyes as they dug holes and filled them back in without dropping in any seedlings!
Finally his curiosity got the best of him so he got out of his car and walked over to talk with them.
“What are you guys doing?” he asked.
“Planting trees,” they said in unison.
“But where are the seedlings?” he asked.
“Oh,” one said, “normally there are three of us. He digs the holes, Jimmy plants the seedling, and I fill the hole...
...but Jimmy is out sick today.”
New unemployed has fallen from 450,000 to 525,000.
It’s just a matter of looking at it from the correct angle..or through the proper lenses.
LOL :D)
real GDP per capita ... if inflation is 1% and the population grows by 2%, we need 3% GDP just to stay even.
And I personally prefer only to count the 55% of the economy that is not federal, state or local govt.
Not to mention, how much of the GDP figures of business spending was money received through government payments based on additional national debt. I highly doubt there is any data capture of that nature. So, if a business spends $10 million of concrete to build a roadway that the federal government paid for but the money was additional national debt spending, does the GDP count that $10 million? I suspect it does. If so, we could easily reduce the GDP by over a trillion dollars or about 10%.
This is what the report has to say on that:
“The decrease in real GDP in 2009 primarily reflected negative contributions from nonresidential fixed investment, exports, private inventory investment, residential fixed investment, and personal consumption expenditures (PCE), that were partly offset by a positive contribution from federal government spending. Imports, which are a subtraction in the calculation of GDP, decreased.”
I hear you. In ‘really’ real terms the results would be horrible. Actually population did grow by 1%, real per capita incomes fell by 3.5% in 2009. CPI fell by 0.7%. And the federal (not including state deficit spending) government added $1.5 trillion to the debt in the process, I think the answer to your ‘really’ real GDP question is -10.7% (1.5 trillion divided by $14 trillion of GDP).
See what the Obama Stimulus will add to GDP over the 5 year period beginning February 2009 here:
The Costly Obama Stimulus Is Not Working -
http://www.idealtaxes.com/post3061.shtml
Nada (that’s Spanish), but it made GDP look better in 2009, if -2.4 is somehow a noble achievement!
GDP over the past two decades has been smoke and mirrors for the majority of working American citizens. With enough economic bubbles, outsourcing, illegals, work visas, lopsided trade agreements for multi-nationals, fraudulent loans, fraudulent markets, redistributed income to deadbeat people and corporations, liars, cheats and thieves high and low, etc., you can make the GDP anything you want it to be.
Kind of a vague statement, really. “Partly offset”, “positive contribution”? Doesn’t exactly say how much of a “contribution” nor how much of an “offset”.
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