Commentary There’s an overly optimistic consensus view about the speed and strength of the U.S. recovery that’s contradicted by facts. It’s true that the U.S. recovery is stronger than the European or Japanese one, but the macro data shows that the euphoric messages about aggregate GDP growth are wildly exaggerated. Of course, GDP is going to rise fast, with estimates of 6 percent for 2021. It would be alarming if it didn’t after a massive chain of stimuli of more than 12 percent of GDP in fiscal spending and $7 trillion in Federal Reserve balance sheet expansion. This is a combined stimulus that’s almost three times larger than that of the 2008 crisis, according to McKinsey (pdf). The question is, what’s the quality of this recovery? The answer is: extremely poor. The United States’ real growth excluding the increase in debt will continue to be exceedingly small. No one can …