Quarter 3 economic statistics are out now and being analyzed by a lot of economists, so I just want to talk a little about the findings and what they mean going forward.
Real GDP increased by 1.5% from the second quarter, and when compared to the growth from the second quarter, which was 3.9%, growth slowed down a considerable amount. Some of the key areas of the growth came from consumer spending, with spending on services increasing significantly. Among that area, spending on health care was the biggest category increase.
Some of the things that offset GDP growth was a decrease in inventory investment on the part of businesses. A reason for this could be because of the rise in consumer spending in the services area rather than wholesale, and businesses noticing that and adjusting accordingly.
Along with the decent GDP growth over the past couple of quarters, the job market has also been turning around from the last few years. Unemployment has been dropping steadily, and employers are opening up new jobs and hiring more and more people. These are signs of a recovering economy, but at the same time things could turn around just as quickly as they have before.