The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for the United States represents the collective results of our labor. If you add up all the products that are made and services that are rendered, that amount represents the GDP. The consumption of those goods and services is called the Standard of Living. The Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA), which is the research arm of the Department of Commerce, provides quarterly statistics about the GDP.
The growth rate, or change from one time period to the next, helps us to determine economic health. Generally, the best growth rate is considered to be between 2% and 3%. This indicates enough growth to provide ample new jobs for job seekers, but not so much growth as to create scarcity of goods and services that might quickly increase prices. At times when unemployment is high, the GDP growth rate needs to rise significantly in order to not only create the standard amount of new jobs, but to get unemployed people back to work.
Seems pretty straight forward, right? Well like so much that touches government hands, it gets much more complicated. The BEA reports are distributed in three releases. The advanced report is released about one month after the quarter ends. The second report is released two months after the quarter. And finally, the third report is released at the end of the quarter. These reports can differ significantly since there is limited data available for the advanced report and all statistics are in by the final report. Sounds like a politicians dream. If the data is not favorable to a politician, the statistics can be explained away at first by lack of data and beaten to death before the true statics are released. On the other hand, if the data looks favorable to a politician, they can plaster the version they like everywhere.
So how do we sort through the politics to get to the true economics? One way is to study the trends over several years. Let’s take a look at the quarterly and annual GDP for the last several years.
GDP by Quarter
GDP by Year
A rate of 2% to 3% is supposed to be good, right? Uh oh. Looks like we’re pretty low, and. . . right now we are experiencing unusually high rates of unemployment. Perhaps we should take what we’ve learned today and add our current employment numbers to the equation. I know what you’re thinking. Aren’t unemployment figures another area where we don’t really understand how the figures are calculated? You bet! Next time we’ll discuss unemployment figures. Then we’ll tie it all together.
Economics In 1 Hour 
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