The White House on Wednesday minimized the idea that the US is going to plunge into a recession, although it is preparing for the publication on Thursday of the data on the gross domestic product (GDP) of the second quarter of the year, which are expected to be negative.
“We are preparing for this in the same way that we prepare for any important report, thinking about how it affects families,” Jared Bernstein, one of the economic advisers to US President Joe Biden, said in an interview with Efe.
Bernstein argued that “families do not eat GDP” and that what matters is to examine how the economic situation affects their jobs, their wages and the price of gasoline or food.
Some analysts and organizations point out that the data that the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BEA) will publish on Thursday will show an economic decline in the second quarter of 2022, which would be added to that of the first quarter, in which the annual rate of the fall stood at 1.6%.
Specifically, the Atlanta Federal Reserve estimates that there will be a drop of 1.2%, while IHS Markit, one of the most important consultants on Wall Street, estimates that it will be 1.3%.
Traditionally, an economy is considered to have entered a recession when it has had two consecutive quarters of falling GDP, but Bernstein argued that there are other factors such as the strength of the labor market or consumer spending, both of which are in good shape, that should be taken into account. consider.
“The idea of a recession is defined by economists as a broad and persistent decline in economic activity. It is not necessarily two quarters of GDP decline, especially if those declines are slight,” said Bernstein, who however said he did not want to paint a “too kind image” of the situation.
He acknowledged that there are families who are suffering from high inflation, at levels not seen since 1981, and explained that the Government is working with Congress to directly help the American people, for example, by lowering the price of medicines.
In the United States, where inflation reached 9.1% in June, the labor market remains in good shape with an unemployment rate of 3.6% – a situation almost full employment – during the last four months, while consumer spending remains on the rise in a sign of economic recovery after the pandemic.