As always, we should be wary of gross domestic product (GDP), because its calculation has counterintuitive components and the headline number can send ambiguous signals.
On Wednesday, the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) estimated that real GDP contracted at a 0.3% rate in Q1. This is down from the +2.4% growth rate in Q4 2024.
There’s lots of great analysis and commentary that’s been published online already. For your convenience, I’ll sum up some key points here.
