Chart of the Day: The Economy Grew 1.9% in Obama’s Final Quarter

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


Economic growth continued to be OK but not great at the end of 2016, growing at an annualized rate of 1.9 percent in the final quarter:

For the record, GDP grew from $14.4 trillion to $18.9 trillion under President Obama’s watch. Adjusted for inflation and population growth, that’s an increase in real per-capita GDP of 10 percent, or 1.25 percent per year. For comparison, here’s a chart of all OECD countries over the past eight years:

This isn’t adjusted for inflation, but it still gives you an idea of how things have been going around the world since the end of the Great Recession and how we compare. In case you’re curious, the two countries above us are Norway and Switzerland.

DONALD TRUMP & DEMOCRACY

Mother Jones was founded to do journalism differently. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after stories others don’t. We’re a nonprofit newsroom, because the kind of truth-telling investigations we do doesn’t happen under corporate ownership.

And we need your support like never before, to fight back against the existential threats American democracy faces. Fundraising for nonprofit media is always a challenge, and we need all hands on deck right now. We have no cushion; we leave it all on the field.

It’s reader support that enables Mother Jones to report the facts that are too difficult, expensive, or inconvenient for other news outlets to uncover. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

DONALD TRUMP & DEMOCRACY

Mother Jones was founded to do journalism differently. We stand for justice and democracy. We reject false equivalence. We go after stories others don’t. We’re a nonprofit newsroom, because the kind of truth-telling investigations we do doesn’t happen under corporate ownership.

And we need your support like never before, to fight back against the existential threats American democracy faces. Fundraising for nonprofit media is always a challenge, and we need all hands on deck right now. We have no cushion; we leave it all on the field.

It’s reader support that enables Mother Jones to report the facts that are too difficult, expensive, or inconvenient for other news outlets to uncover. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate