Hassett rips bad math on US economic growth
White House Council of Economic Advisers Chairman Kevin Hassett on Thursday identified bad math in the latest read on U.S. economic growth.
Although the U.S. economy reportedly grew by an estimated 2.9 percent in 2018, Hassett said it was actually a 3.1 percent year, citing the figure for the fourth-quarter-2017 over fourth-quarter-2018.
“There are two different ways to measure year and one is year-over-year and quarter-four-over-quarter-four,” he told FOX Business' Stuart Varney on Thursday. “And everybody is picking the lower number because they don’t want to give the president credit for 3.1 [percent].”
Hassett also added that despite a poor first-quarter seasonal adjustment process over the last decade, he still expects 3 percent growth in 2019.
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“Every Q1 is about 1 percent below what you expect to have for the year,” he said. “We still are very, very confident that we are going to have a 3 percent year for 2019 and so what that means you should expect Q1 to be about 2 [percent].”