Historical GDP Numbers: 1947-Present

Today's initial GDP reading of 0.6% was the lowest since the first quarter of 2007. GDP was this low just 3 quarters ago, so it's not that out of the ordinary. And it's important to remember that the number will be revised two more times before it is final. It could go higher, but it could also go lower.

Below we highlight the historical final annualized GDP numbers going back to 1947 (4Q '07 is the only one that is not a final number). We also highlight with red dots any time that GDP was less than 1%. While a drop below 1% often times means we'll end up getting 2 consecutive quarters of negative growth, it doesn't always mean it will happen. In fact, while the NBER declared a recession in 2001, we haven't had 2 consecutive quarters of actual negative GDP growth since 1991.

click to enlarge

Comments

[Alfabeto:]

Do you realize that there is a relationship between USA wars and GDP growth?. I don't know why any economist researched this, there is a Nobel price waiting for this research.

Wars produce first a depression but then a huge economic growth. Wars are for Americans what pyramids were for Egyptians. They produces near full employment. Unfortunately, Americas today economy is addicted to wars

After WWII there was a huge growth until ends of 40's, the same with Korea's and Vietnam's wars.

First Iraq wars produces the expansion of the USA economy in the 90s and It can be predicted that the Iraq war II will produce a growth in the next decade? I bet yes.

Thanks George W. Bush.

2008 May 10 12:27 PM

[Mike the Ch...:]

I agree that past wars have lead to GDP growth, but I disagree that Iraq War 2 will lead to the same growth. In previous wars there has been huge debt-based investment in DOMESTIC manufacturing infrastructure. This is the first war where we have used debt to invest in foreign infrastructure. We will see no help to our GDP from this war. While I'm usually an optimist, my assessment for the current situation is we're toast unless the Obama administration goes into serious deficit spending on domestic infrastructure such as public works, education and energy technology.


On May 10 12:27 PM Alfabeto wrote:

> Do you realize that there is a relationship between USA wars and
> GDP growth?. I don't know why any economist researched this, there
> is a Nobel price waiting for this research.
>
> Wars produce first a depression but then a huge economic growth.
> Wars are for Americans what pyramids were for Egyptians. They produces
> near full employment. Unfortunately, Americas today economy is addicted
> to wars
>
> After WWII there was a huge growth until ends of 40's, the same with
> Korea's and Vietnam's wars.
>
> First Iraq wars produces the expansion of the USA economy in the
> 90s and It can be predicted that the Iraq war II will produce a growth
> in the next decade? I bet yes.
>
> Thanks George W. Bush.

2008 Nov 09 02:16 PM

[Pearl Little:]

It looks to me as if most US wars in fact brought about low growth. The beginning of a war often caused a bounce in growth by increasing military spending, but by the end of the war this growth generally ceased and was followed by a period of no growth. Only when there was a longer period of peace did GDP show steady growth, thus we can expect and in fact we see that Iraq II is bringing about the typical, though this time much worse recession. And we shouldn't expect much growth until we have a period of extended peace.

May 15 04:01 PM