Ameriško gospodarstvo je večje, kot je bilo pred pandemijo, a Covid bi še vedno lahko odločil, kaj se bo zgodilo naslednje

Ameriško gospodarstvo je zdaj večje, kot je bilo pred pandemijo, vendar je njegova stopnja rasti letos morda dosegla vrh s precej počasnejšo hitrostjo, kot je bilo pričakovano.

That doesn’t mean the second half of the year won’t be strong or the recovery will be derailed. The question is how strong growth can be, with a number of factors that can impact it, including the delta variant of the coronavirus.

Bruto domači proizvod se je pospešil po 6.5-odstotni letni stopnji in the second quarter, slightly better than the revised 6.3% gain in the first quarter. But it was well below the 8.4% expected by economists, and far less than their earlier forecasts that growth in this year’s peak quarter would be 10% or higher.

BDP je merilo vsega blaga in storitev, proizvedenih v obdobju od aprila do junija. Po podatkih ministrstva za trgovino se je četrtletna raven BDP v drugem četrtletju dvignila na 19.4 bilijona dolarjev, kar je več od 19.2 bilijona dolarjev v četrtem četrtletju 2019.

“We’ve noted that the Q2 GDP growth pace is a good gauge of the ‘speed limit’ for the economy, given widespread supply chain disruptions. That speed limit is a bit lower than we thought, and quite a bit lower than most forecasters and government institutions were expecting,” wrote Mike Englund, chief economist at Action Economics. “If shortages continue, the likelihood is that the more optimistic forecasts in the marketplace will need to be marked-down for Q3 as well.”

Englund said he will adjust his forecast for the second half, but now sees 2021 GDP growing by 6.1% year-over-year and 6.2% fourth quarter over fourth quarter. He said the Fed’s central tendency forecast is much higher, at 6.8% to 7.3%.

Hitrost rasti v drugem četrtletju je bila najhitrejša po tretjem četrtletju lani, ko je gospodarstvo se je okrepilo za 33.4 % po osupljivem zlomu v drugi četrtini. Poleg tega je bila to najboljša stopnja rasti po letu 2003.

Ekonomiste so presenetili nekateri elementi poročila za drugo četrtletje. Zaloge so ostale težke, medtem ko so številna podjetja pričakovala, da jih bodo začela obnavljati. Državna poraba je bil tudi negativen, prav tako nekatere gradbene kategorije.

“Everything that was expected to be weak came in a little weaker. There were more weak surprises than strong surprises,” said Tom Simons, money market economist at Jefferies. “At this point, we’re really in no-man’s land on the current economic data coming in. It keeps coming in softer than expected, but not at outright soft levels. I think we’re going to keep at incoming data to figure out what’s happening in Q3.”

Potrošnik je bil svetla točka, saj je poraba presegla pričakovanja. Potrošnja se je v prvem četrtletju povečala za 11.8 %, storitve pa so se povečale za 12 %. Potrošniki so približno 70% vseh dejavnosti.

Simons je dejal, da se obremenitev zaradi zmanjševanja spodbud že kaže v drugem četrtletju, po velikem izbruhu državne porabe. Državna poraba za neobrambo se je na primer zmanjšala za 10.4 %, potem ko se je v prvem četrtletju povečala za 40.8 %.

“You had negative net exports and a pretty substantial drawdown in inventories as well. All that combined to produce a pretty soft headline number,” he said.

Simons je dejal, da naj bi se gospodarska aktivnost okrepila septembra, ko se bodo šole znova odprle in naj bi se delavci vrnili v svoje pisarne.

“I wouldn’t write off the rest of the year … I think there’s still reason to be optimistic about the rest of this year and 2022,” he said, adding he expects a kick from inventory rebuilding.

Inflacija je bila del upora v drugem četrtletju. Inflacija, merjena z osnovnimi izdatki za osebno potrošnjo, se je povečala za 6.1 %, kar je najvišja stopnja po letu 1983.

“We don’t expect inflation to keep up at that rate. A reason why we still expect to see solid growth this year is because we’re not going to see as high inflation,” said Luke Tilley, chief economist at Wilmington Trust.

Toda ponoven izbruh Covida je v veliki meri nad obeti.

Tilley je dejal, da če bo različica delta letos dejavnik upočasnitve rasti, se bo gospodarska aktivnost razširila v naslednje leto. Toda če bi se gospodarstvo upočasnilo, ker so potrošniki porabili svoje prihranke ali spremenili potrošniške navade za storitve, bi to povzročilo bolj negativne obete za gospodarstvo.

Poudaril je, da način, kako se podjetja odzivajo na pandemijo, oblikuje porabo. Na primer, poraba za strukture se je zmanjšala, intelektualna lastnina in oprema pa sta bili višji.

“I worry more that we’re moving into a world where, yes, technology enables us to keep spending regardless of what happens with Covid. That keeps the overall economy going but it means also you could permanently eliminate some jobs more rapidly,” said Diane Swonk, chief economist at Grant Thornton.

Swonk je dejal, da bi večji izbruh Covida lahko sprožil vedenje potrošnikov, ki bi lahko vplivalo na porabo in upočasnilo rast.

“I would expect people could delay and defer which will elongate the recovery,” she said. “Disruptions that were once outliers and now normal.”