[el chupacabra]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp..._ec_fi/economy

I thought this was funny since the Bush and repubs tried so hard before to convince us that his policies were responsible for the former "fastest economic growth in 20 years". The fact is that supposed fastest economic growth was just a cycle the whole world was going through which made that rate the world's average; I believe is something like 4.6%. Now we can't even say the US economy is keeping up with the average.

I wonder who willtake credit for this one.

[SimeyTheLimey]

Jimmy Carter would have killed for 3.1%. So would Jerry Ford. And so, of course, would a number of our competitor countries in Western Europe. Spinning that as a bad number is pretty funny. Especially when it is coupled with low and falling unemployment, low inflation and so on. It's a very healthy economy by both world standards, and our own post war standards.

Your "world average" argument is also pretty funny, since that average includes the US, which is (from memory) roughly 35% of the world's GDP and therefore rather influential on the average. It would be interesting to see what that average would be if you took the US and China out of the statistics. Rather lower, I suspect.

Anyway, why is it that liberals are only happy if they think (wrongly in this case) that things are going badly for their country? Bizarre behavior.

[SVass]

You are missing several important points. The growth rate dropped from 3.8% to 3.1%. Meanwhile, they argue that the long term rate will be 1.9% in order that Social Security will go bankrupt whenever and simultaneously that the long term rate will be 2.8% so that their private/personal accounts will earn 6.5%. Obviously the current downturn is a hangover from the Clinton recession. sa,

[Secret__Police]

What will happen when the world moves away from the USA Petrol dollar?

[TETENAL]

Expected growth in Germany for 2005 is 0.7%.

[Shaddim]

Originally Posted by Secret__Police

What will happen when the world moves away from the USA Petrol dollar?

We'll be back to sailing across the Atlantic and Pacific.

[RIRedinPA]

Isn't China predicting 9% growth?

[el chupacabra]

Originally Posted by SimeyTheLimey

Jimmy Carter would have killed for 3.1%. So would Jerry Ford.

This isn't the age of Jimmy Carter, or Ford.

And so, of course, would a number of our competitor countries in Western Europe.

Acutally only a few.

Spinning that as a bad number is pretty funny. Especially when it is coupled with low and falling unemployment, low inflation and so on. It's a very healthy economy by both world standards, and our own post war standards.

Yeah its not that bad; It doesn't really effect my standard of living any. I just though it was about as funny as the big hoopla republicans made When we had 4.4% growth rate (Which was slightly lower than the world average), and then tried to take responsibility for it. While Bush capitalized on this I thought to myself 'didn't the soviet union have the fastest growth rate just before it callapsed.'
We do have the highest GDP per capita if you want to look at that but only about 9% higher than countries like ireland, UK etc. So its not like the US is that far ahead.

Your "world average" argument is also pretty funny, since that average includes the US, which is (from memory) roughly 35% of the world's GDP and therefore rather influential on the average.

Actually its more like 20% and lets remeber the US didn't bring the average up it brought it down, the US is 4.4 the world is 4.9.

It would be interesting to see what that average would be if you took the US and China out of the statistics. Rather lower, I suspect.

It is lowerd from 4.9 to 4.64 when we take out China and US I believe, but why take out China?
I just got this statistics from the CIA's factbook.

[f1000]

Originally Posted by el chupacabra

Actually its more like 20% and lets remeber the US didn't bring the average up it brought it down, the US is 4.4 the world is 4.9.
It is lowerd from 4.9 to 4.64 when we take out China and US I believe, but why take out China?
I just got this statistics from the CIA's factbook.

That's a comparison of GDP (PPP), not GDP.

Simey's right, the U.S. is still ~35% of World GDP.

GDP 2002
------------
World: $21,929,047.00 (excluding the U.S.)
U.S. $10,383,100.00


The following links show historical graphs of the real GDP per capita relative to the United States of some countries:

Ireland
U.K.
Germany
France
Italy
Canada
Japan
Iran

China
Brazil
Russia
India

The so-called BRIC countries exhibit inconsistent growth and start from very low baselines. China is the standout from the pack, but its GDP/capita is still only a small fraction of our own.

EDIT: I thought that I should add the entire G7. As you can see, el chupacabra, almost all of the G7 countries have been falling behind the U.S. for more than a decade.

[SimeyTheLimey]

A factor you are forgetting is that the US is the world's richest economy. It's relatively easy for a developing economy to grow at an impressive percentage rate. If you start with relatively little, a little bit of absolute grown translates into a large amount of percentage growth. To take a simplisic example, if you have an income of $100 and you add $100 you had a percentage growth of 100%. If you had an income of $1000 and added $100 you have only grown by 10%. Either way you only added $100. It isn't as though the economy that added 100% is performing better in an absolute since than the economy that added 10%.

Thus, the proper comparisn isn't the "world economy" because most of the rest of the world is considerably poorer than the US. A better comparison is either our peers in the developed world -- particularly the EU, or our own post-war track record. By either of those comparisons the US economy is doing just fine.

By the way, the US represented 32.3% of the world's GDP in 2002. My best-of-my-recollection figure of roughly 35% was accurate.



In any case, you might like to look at this.

U.S. to Power Global GDP - IMF

LONDON (Reuters) - The world economy will expand 4.3 percent this year as stronger-than-expected growth in the United States, China and elsewhere balances weakness in Europe and Japan, according to International Monetary Fund figures obtained by Reuters on Tuesday.

The 2005 growth forecast is unchanged from a previous projection made by the Fund in its semi-annual world economic outlook (WEO), but the pattern of growth is very different from that presented in its last forecast in September 2004.

The IMF now expects the U.S. economy to grow 3.6 percent this year, up from a previous 3.5 percent projection, but sees Japanese gross domestic product rising just 0.7 percent, down from 2.3 percent.

Eurozone growth is also seen weaker than last autumn at plus 1.6 percent, against 2.2 percent foreseen earlier, with Germany's economy expected to grow just 0.8 percent compared with a prior 1.8 percent forecast.

"Recent developments have led to a downward revision of the 2005 (eurozone) growth forecast to 1.6 percent," the Fund will say in its latest WEO to be published on Wednesday, according to the extract obtained by Reuters.

"The risks to this outlook, however, lie predominantly on the downside," it said, adding the European Central Bank should be prepared to cut interest rates if necessary.

It cited the risk that current account imbalances will put upward pressure on the euro, crimping exports from Germany, or that domestic demand could be hurt by high oil prices, reforms in several countries or even a house price crash in Ireland or Spain.

"In these circumstances, (European Central Bank) monetary policy should remain firmly on hold until a self-sustaining recovery is clearly in place," it said.

"Indeed, were downside risks to growth to materialize or the euro to appreciate significantly further, an easing of monetary policy would need to be considered," it added.

The ECB has left its key lending rate at 2.00 percent since June 2003, but economists expect it to raise rates later this year provided the shaky recovery regains some momentum.

[f1000]

Originally Posted by SVass

You are missing several important points. The growth rate dropped from 3.8% to 3.1%.

This growth rate is for a quarter. It could jump back up next quarter. In any case, the U.S. has consistently exhibited a steady growth rate over the long term, which is why its Treasury bonds are in such demand. Other countries, such as Brazil, have periods of strong growth followed by periods of strong decline. Latin American countries are particularly guilty of this.

World GDP growth has actually fallen behind that of the U.S. The U.S. share of world GDP has been increasing for the past decade or so.

[SVass]

Let me respond to the use of phoney numbers. When Congress allowed corporations to stop contributing to pensions, corporate earnings soared (the former pension money became income). When capital gain income and dividend income is taxed less than "earned" income, money changes from "earned" to whatever. When we compute a world gdp, we compare apples with oranges with coconuts ad infinitum. Anyone who believes a CIA factoid number should be hired to show us the WMDs in IRAQ. John Bogle (of Vanguard fame) says that we should all worry about our extreme budget and trade deficits and our increasing inflation. This recession cannot be blamed on Clinton or Carter. sam

[f1000]

Originally Posted by SVass

Let me respond to the use of phoney numbers. When Congress allowed corporations to stop contributing to pensions, corporate earnings soared (the former pension money became income). When capital gain income and dividend income is taxed less than "earned" income, money changes from "earned" to whatever. When we compute a world gdp, we compare apples with oranges with coconuts ad infinitum.

That's pretty immature of you. When the 3.1% GDP made the current administration look bad, you were more than willing to gloat over it. Now that we've shown you such blips mean little to the U.S. economic juggernaut, you want to disavow the entire GDP.

John Bogle (of Vanguard fame) says that we should all worry about our extreme budget and trade deficits and our increasing inflation. This recession cannot be blamed on Clinton or Carter. sam

I'll take Bogle seriously after he applies for Chinese citizenship. As for recession, what are you babbling about?

[NYCFarmboy]

it is still growing MUCH faster than Germany which is on the verge of a recession/depression.

[SVass]

[QUOTE=f1000]That's pretty immature of you. When the 3.1% GDP made the current administration look bad, you were more than willing to gloat over it. Now that we've shown you such blips mean little to the U.S. economic juggernaut, you want to disavow the entire GDP.

You can't read. I wasn't gloating about last quarter. I originally said that your future projections state that the economy is going to collapse soon. I assume that you believe that your party will be in control during the on coming catastrophe. In my second comment, I said that your numbers are bad as recent US numbers are not correct. Wait for the ususal corrections. sam

[f1000]

Originally Posted by SVass

You can't read. I wasn't gloating about last quarter. I originally said that your future projections state that the economy is going to collapse soon. I assume that you believe that your party will be in control during the on coming catastrophe. In my second comment, I said that your numbers are bad as recent US numbers are not correct. Wait for the ususal corrections. sam

Sure you were gloating, SVass. How can you be so sure that GDP growth for this quarter won't be revised upwards? It's happened many times before. Last year, for example, the final year end GDP turned out to be higher than analysts had predicted. Maybe it'll be like 2003 and next quarter we'll have a 6.2% growth rate (unlikely, but fun to speculate).

And again, please explain your recession statement. I wasn't aware that we were in a recession. As for an impending collapse, save the hyperbole for your drama classes.

The U.S. is a very steady and reliable player in the world economy. No brief flash in the pan like China is going to change that fact for a long time, and no single Presidency is either.


U.S. real GDP per capita from 1950 to 2000

[Big Mac]

A recession is classically defined as two consecutive quarters of negative growth, so this is not a recession. Of course, this number does appear to be a bit low, considering that we're fighting wars, and wars produce inflationary growth.

[Millennium]

So let me get this straight, SVass. Bush touts the fastest economic growth in 20 years, and you blame him for a single quarter that only sets a record as far back as two years? This does not sound like a very good basis for comparison, given that your measures of time are messed up on not one but two axes: the amount of time being measured (one quarter) and the amount of time being used for comparison (two years). Of course, the fact that you project this as the growth rate going forward also isn't very good statistical form.

[SVass]

Originally Posted by Millennium

So let me get this straight, SVass. Bush touts the fastest economic growth in 20 years, and you blame him for a single quarter that only sets a record as far back as two years? This does not sound like a very good basis for comparison, given that your measures of time are messed up on not one but two axes: the amount of time being measured (one quarter) and the amount of time being used for comparison (two years). Of course, the fact that you project this as the growth rate going forward also isn't very good statistical form.

You Republicans continue to divert attention from your leader who is projecting a 1.9% 75 year growth rate. He did it again last night. I don't care what the current growth rate is and I said that twice. Short term results are meaningless as they can be biased by special events such as 9/11, special charges. special foreign repatriation rules, etc. By the way, the ten year Treasury bond rate (the best predictor for recession) is coming down rapidly to its current level matching July of 2003. You and the market are projecting the future as a disaster, not me. sam