Wall Street Journal Economic Forecast Survey January 2017 – Notable Aspects

The January 2017 Wall Street Journal Economic Forecast Survey was published on January 12, 2017.  The headline is “Forecasters See Upside Risks to Their Economic Outlooks at Highest in More Than Two Years.”

I found numerous items to be notable – although I don’t necessarily agree with them – both within the article and in the “Economist Q&A” section.

Two excerpts:

In the most recent survey, 64% of respondents said the risk was to the upside, the highest in over two years, and a reversal from the mood of recent years, which was focused on potential risks from a global economic slowdown.

also:

In anticipation of Mr. Trump’s presidency, economic forecasts have already risen. The average forecast is for GDP growth of 2.4% in 2017 and 2.5% in 2018. That is a 0.2 percentage point increase for 2017 and 0.5 percentage point for 2018.

As stated in the article, the survey’s respondents were 67 academic, financial and business economists.  Not every economist answered every question.  The survey occurred on January 6, 2017 to January 10, 2017.

As seen in the “Recession Probability” section, the average response as to the odds of another recession starting within the next 12 months was 16.49%. The individual estimates, of those who responded, ranged from 0% to 75%.  For reference, the average response in December’s survey was 16.79%.

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The current average forecasts among economists polled include the following:

GDP:

full-year 2016:  2.0%

full-year 2017:  2.4%

full-year 2018:  2.5%

full-year 2019:  2.2%

Unemployment Rate:

December 2017: 4.5%

December 2018: 4.4%

December 2019: 4.5%

10-Year Treasury Yield:

December 2017: 2.89%

December 2018: 3.36%

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Please Note – The above is excerpted from the EconomicGreenfield.com (published by RevSD, LLC) post of January 12, 2017, titled “The January 2017 Wall Street Journal Economic Forecast Survey”

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RevSD, LLC offers the above commentary for informational purposes only, and does not necessarily agree with the views expressed by these outside parties.

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RevSD, LLC is a management consulting firm and strategic advisory that focuses on the analysis of current and future weak(ening) economic conditions, and offers businesses and other entities advice, strategies, and actionable methods on how to optimally adapt to such challenging, complex conditions.