Assessing the Bureau of Economic Analysis 2018 Q1 GDP Estimate: https://taxfoundation.org/assessing-bureau-economic-analysis-2018-q1-gdp/
Kiplinger’s latest forecast for the GDP growth rate: Kiplinger's GDP Outlook: Economic Growth Surprises | Kiplinger
And?
The first cite reiterates what I posted, a decline in GDP and business investment. The second cite is merely a forecast, which is already wrong as reality is going in the opposite direction.
Only a person with no regard for the truth would describe the link above as reiterating what you’ve posted. The same is true for your characterization of the second link, as your characterization is simply false.
It’s great that you have such firm political beliefs, but it’s not all that much fun to debate things with a person who time and time again demonstrates his complete and total disregard for the facts.
HUH?
~ From your first cite:
“first quarter real GDP rose by 2.3 percent (annualized rate), which was slightly slower than real GDP growth in quarter 4 of 2017 (2.9 percent)”
Gee, now where did we see that before? Oh right, IN MY POST.
~ From your first cite:
“fixed investment in equipment grew by 4.7 percent (annualized) in quarter 1, which is slower than the previous period, which saw annualized growth of 11.6 percent”
Gee, now where did we see a mention of decelerated fixed investment before? Oh right, IN MY POST.
The facts I posted were REITERATED within your first cite. Perhaps you need to check your dictionary for the definition of “reiterate”.
Except I didn’t “characterize” your second link, Kiplinger did.
~ From your second link:
“Kiplinger’s latest forecast for the GDP growth rate”
I assume you comprehend what a “forecast” is, and is not. It is not fact, it is merely a prediction of what someone believes will occur in the future. As already mentioned, the first quarter already went in the opposite direction of their forecast.
Right, and you conveniently omitted the two sentences that follow, which say “However, GDP in quarter 1 of 2018 grew by 2.9 percent over quarter 1 of 2017 last year. This is an acceleration of the U.S. economy.”
The article also cautions that “one quarter of data is probably not enough to make any strong conclusions about the impact of any given policy.”
Right, and the article goes on to explain: "However, as Greg Ip of The Wall Street Journal mentioned, we don’t know to what extent this is timing. Companies may have pulled many planned investments forward into quarter 4 of 2017 from quarter 1 of 2018, which would have the effect of reducing investment growth in quarter 1 of 2018.
It is also worth mentioning that investment in nonresidential structures ticked up very slightly over the last quarter (about 0.1 percent of GDP) and investment in equipment remained steady as a share of GDP.
While the data in this first full quarter since passage of the TCJA shows some positive trends in GDP, it shows a slight reduction in the growth of investment, possibly due to timing. As we get more data over time, we will be able to make stronger observations about the economy after the passage of the tax law. But we should always be careful of making too strong conclusions as we can never observe the counterfactual, or the economy in which the tax law never passed."
The amount of intellectual dishonesty contained in your posts is rather amazing. Your claim that the first cite “reiterates” what you’ve posted is akin to you posting an urban legend and being presented with a Snopes article that quotes the legend and explains that it is false. You then claim that the Snopes article “reiterates” what you’ve posted because Snopes quotes the urban legend.
Again, you are being intellectually dishonest, as the article also discusses both the fourth quarter of last year, and the first quarter of this year.
The article says:
"GDP increased 2.3% in the first quarter of 2018, a decent showing. Consumer spending rose a modest 1.1%, but this was expected after a spending splurge in the fourth quarter. But inflation-adjusted consumer disposable income climbed a robust 3.4% because of the tax cuts, setting up consumption resurgence in the later quarters of this year. Businesses are stockpiling inventory in anticipation. Also, exports of food, consumer goods and cars grew more strongly than expected, benefitting U.S. manufacturers and farmers.
Fourth-quarter growth in 2017 of 2.9% is stronger than it looks. Consumers, businesses and even government picked up the spending pace. Consumers spent heavily in nearly all categories. The flip side of strong consumer spending was a big jump in imports, which detracted from overall growth. Housing made a turnaround in the fourth quarter, and business equipment purchases grew a little faster. An unexplained drop in business inventories prevented the headline number from being much higher."
You can disagree with the analysis all you want, but when you falsely misstate the articles’ conclusion, you simply highlight the intellectually dishonest nature of your posts.
It wasn’t convenience, but irrelevancy. There is no economic metric of contrasting a quarter with the same quarter from a year prior. The only rationale for such a ridiculous statement is to attempt to obscure and obfuscate the fact that the GDP SLOWED from the 4th QTR of 2017 to the 1st QTR of 2018.
BTW, you obviously FAILED to check your dictionary for the definition of “reiterate”.
Hilarious. Tell that to the White House and Congressional GOP who are claiming otherwise.
“MAY” ?
Sorry, “may” is not a fact.
GDP declined.
~
As to your repeated baseless, unsupported, unsubstantiated, ad hominem attacks, they are simply juvenile.
If you believe this /\
Why did you post this \/
Because your former quote references GDP, where there is no economic metric contrasting a quarter with the same quarter from the previous year.
Whereas, your latter quote references business investment, with some measured quarter to previous quarter, and others measured against the same quarter of the previous year, just as home sales are correctly measured to the month in the previous year, not to the previous month, because sales tend to rise as temperatures rise and fall as temperatures fall.
Got it ?
Yes. I think we all “got” that you will use whatever statistics are available to suit your own viewpoint, yet when other people do the same thing, you call their statements ridiculous and claim only they are obscuring and obfuscating the facts.
Unfortunate that you’re so uninformed in regards to economic metrics that you lash out in ignorance and ad hominem attacks.
I appreciate the irony of calling me uninformed and ignorant while also bemoaning my attacks as ad hominem.
IRS warns taxpayers not to fall for those “our state is a charity” scams coming out of CA, NY, CT, etc as an effort to get around the limited deductions of state taxes. These efforts will be disallowed shortly under forthcoming federal regulations.
I think the states are making a big mistake. First, there are legitimate, strong legal arguments for both sides. I think the federal government’s argument is more solid, but it’d be personally beneficial to me for the states to win.
I’d also say that the states are definitely ready for this. The challenge from the IRS was almost guaranteed. The IRS is going through this unusual and bizarre process though. I also think the doctrine they seem to be relying on (economic substance doctrine) was a mistake, but we’ll find out when we see the regs.
Either way though, the states are turning this into federal government vs state governments battle. The feds took away the benefits to our citizens, it wasn’t fair, and we deserve to benefit. IMO it’s a poor framing politically and could be problematic legally. They should have just focused on what they wanted to do. Why not just say the states are worried about the consequences to charitable organizations and want to make sure charitable organizations can survive. But I guess they gain more immediate benefit by just attacking Trump and the greedy Republicans, even at possible detriment to the ultimate bills.
It Just Keeps Submarining
According to a Monmouth University poll released this week, just 34% of Americans said they approve of the GOP tax reform package, compared to 41% who disapprove. That’s down from April, when 40 percent of Americans said they approved of the legislation.
UPDATE:
Turns out that GDP did NOT decline from 2.9% in the 4th QTR of 2017 down to 2.3% in the 1st QTR of 2018, instead the final revision shows that GDP declined from 2.9% in the 4th QTR of 2017 to only 2.0% in the 1st QTR of 2018.
Ya betcha, those GOP tax cuts sure inspired confidence and spurred investment and boosted the economy, just as the WH and GOP promised… Oh wait.
NJ politicians had been arguing about plugging the giant hole in their budget with higher personal income taxes or higher corporate income taxes. In the end, they compromised and raised both! The top bracket for NJ individuals is now 10.75% (previously ~9%) and if you earn the $5M+ to be subject to it, I’m pretty sure you can afford to leave.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/new-jerseys-tax-gift-to-florida-1530481356
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-07-02/murphy-signs-n-j-budget-after-last-minute-deal-averts-shutdown
The two Democrats claim this will do no harm because about 0.04% of New Jersey taxpayers will get smacked. But those taxpayers account for 12.5% of state income-tax revenue and their investment income is highly mobile. The state treasurer said in 2016 that a mere 100 filers pay more than 5.5% of all state receipts. Billionaire David Tepper escaped from New Jersey for Florida in 2015, and other hedge fund managers could follow. Between 2012 and 2016 a net $11.9 billion of income left New Jersey, according to the IRS.
With bright ideas like this, it’s no surprise their state’s debt credit rating is the second lowest behind only Illinois.
I don’t know what the sweet spot for state tax is. Here we got no income tax and that create an entire different set of issues with raising property tax and sales tax which are very regressive.
Those states can’t run a balanced budget even with the federal deduction subsidizing their already high tax rates and are already at the top of the state debt/resident rankings. If they’re complaining about budgets, they have no further than to look in the mirror for their solution. Wasting their tax payer money on a hopeless grandstanding legal challenge is just indicative of their politicians’ priorities.