US Economy Grows Moderately as GDP Ticks Up

The U.S. economy grew at a rate of 2.4% in the second quarter of 2023, according to gross domestic product (GDP) statistics released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) on Thursday morning.

Real GDP increased by 2.0% in the first quarter of 2022 after being revised up from an initial estimate of 1.1%, according to the BEA. Economists expected the GDP would be around 2% in the second quarter of 2023, following high inflation and an interest rate increase from the Federal Reserve on Wednesday. 

“That’s not great, but not terrible—at least in normal circumstances.” E.J. Antoni, research fellow at the Heritage Foundation’s Grover M. Hermann Center for the Federal Budget, told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

“Virtually every economic indicator is pointing to recession, probably starting sometime around December,” Antoni added. “The Biden administration made a bad fiscal situation inestimably worse by stomping on the gas and further increasing the spending, borrowing, and printing of money by the government. That simultaneously caused 40-year-high inflation and crowded out private investment, both of which are starving economic growth.”