Trump Administration Finally Admits the Economy Isn’t Booming

Here’s an unexpected jolt of reality from the Trump administration:

President Trump’s top economists predict the U.S. economy will not grow at a rate of 3 percent or higher this year unless Congress enacts a major infrastructure package and additional tax cuts….In the annual Economic Report of the President released on Thursday, Trump’s Council of Economic Advisers predicts that if the president and Congress do not make further policy changes, the U.S. economy will grow at a 2.4 percent annual pace this year and at a 2.3 percent pace in 2021. That kind of growth is well below what Trump promised and similar to what occurred under President Barack Obama.

In other words, the economy is going to continue growing at about the same steady rate it’s been growing for the past decade. The nonsensical projections of 3+ percent growth that the Trumpies made in order to get elected were just that: nonsensical. Or, in the usual vernacular, they were lies. It’s not as if Trump’s economists haven’t known this all along, after all.

As for Trump himself, he hasn’t commented yet. When he does, I suppose he’ll whine yet again about how the mean old Federal Reserve is keeping interest rates too high. You may judge for yourself:

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This is how change happens.

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This investigative reporting takes time too. Months of research. Weeks of writing, editing, and fact checking—and putting together the photography, art, video, and audio that tell the stories in a new way, illuminating new perspectives and voices.

We can afford to take our time because we don’t report to oligarchs or corporations. We report to you, and for you.

And the stakes are high. Democracy is on the defense. We’ve been exposing corruption and scandal for five decades, and this is a pivotal moment in our country’s history. Will democracy prevail? We won’t wait for time to tell—independent journalism is essential for democracy, and we’ll keep doing our part to amplify the free press.

So, we’re asking: Will you join the fight? Mother Jones has been here for 50 years, and we need your support to fuel the future of investigative journalism. Mark our 50th anniversary with a gift of any amount.

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