Thursday's report on third-quarter GDP growth was the strongest we've seen in some time. In historic terms, 2.5 percent growth is fairly normal, but in these beleaguered times, it was the most growth we've seen in a year, and nearly doubled the second quarter's 1.3 percent.
The biggest growth trigger was personal consumption expenditures, which grew 2.4 percent in the quarter after growing just 0.7 percent in the second quarter. Sales of computers accounted for 0.21 percentage points of the growth in GDP after adding 0.07 percentage points in the second quarter. Motor vehicles had accounted for a 0.10 percentage-point drop in the second-quarter GDP, but rebounded to add 0.07 percentage points to this quarter's growth.
With this solid quarter, we've turned a significant corner: The overall economy has now surpassed the size it was prior to the recession. Our inflation-adjusted gross domestic product totals roughly $13.35 trillion at this point. The size of the economy had peaked at around $13.33 trillion towards the end of 2007, before contracting in the recession.
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