Commentary
What a difference a press release makes, even when it is only talking about the past.
As we rolled out of bed this morning, economists surveyed by the Wall Street Journal were confident that economic output grew 0.3 percent in the second quarter.
But then came the witching hour of 8:30am Eastern Time when the Commerce Department released the world’s most important number. The GDP contracted in the 2nd quarter by 0.9 percent. We might as well make it easy and say it: 1 percent.
That fall not only outstrips expectations. It is vastly worse than even the most pessimistic of forecasts. Later adjustments could even worsen the numbers, as happened in the first quarter. Is it a recession? That depends. To paraphrase the Marx Brothers: who are you going to believe, the Biden administration or your own eyes?…