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3Q2015 GDP preliminary estimate increased 2.1%
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Real gross domestic product -- the value of the goods and services produced by the nation’s economy less the value of the goods and services used up in production, adjusted for price changes -- increased at an annual rate of 2.1 percent in the third quarter of 2015, according to the "second" estimate released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. In the second quarter, real GDP increased 3.9 percent.
The increase in real GDP in the third quarter primarily reflected positive contributions from personal consumption expenditures (PCE), nonresidential fixed investment, state and local government spending, residential fixed investment, and exports that were partly offset by a negative contribution from private inventory investment. Imports, which are a subtraction in the calculation of GDP, increased.
The deceleration in real GDP in the third quarter primarily reflected a downturn in private inventory investment and decelerations in exports, in PCE, in nonresidential fixed investment, in state and local government spending, and in residential fixed investment that were partly offset by a deceleration in imports.
Real gross domestic income (GDI) -- the value of the costs incurred and the incomes earned in the production of goods and services in the nation’s economy -- increased 3.1 percent in the third quarter, compared with an increase of 2.2 percent (revised) in the second. The average of real GDP and real GDI, a supplemental measure of U.S. economic activity that equally weights GDP and GDI, increased 2.6 percent in the third quarter, compared with an increase of 3.0 percent (revised) in the second.
The upward revision to the percent change in real GDP primarily reflected an upward revision to private inventory investment that was partly offset by downward revisions to PCE and to exports.
For the second quarter of 2015, real GDI was revised up 1.5 percentage points, from 0.7 percent to 2.2 percent, primarily reflecting an upward revision to private wages and salaries based on newly available second-quarter tabulations from the BLS quarterly census of employment and wages.
Posted: November 24, 2015 Tuesday 08:30 AM