WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 24th February, 2022) US Gross Domestic Product grew by 7% in the final quarter of last year, the Commerce Department said on Thursday in its second estimate for the quarter which came in higher than its previous estimate of 6.9%.
"Real gross domestic product (GDP) increased at an annual rate of 7.0 percent in the fourth quarter of 2021," the Bureau of Economic Analysis, a unit within the Commerce Department, said in a news release.
The department issues three GDP readings altogether for each quarter.
Economists surveyed by US media had projected a 7% reading for the second estimate on the quarter, due to the faster-than-expected growth in inflation since the first estimate.
"The inflation numbers continued to ratchet higher but overall the market has much more to worry about than what was happening 2-5 months ago in the US economy," economist Adam Button said in a post on the ForexLive forum.
After a 3.5% contraction in 2020 GDP forced by the coronavirus crisis, the US economy is thought to have grown by 5.7% for all of 2021.
But inflation has been expanding faster, growing by 5.8% in the year to December, its most since 1982, according to the Consumer price Index published by the Commerce Department.
