After two years of really exceptional economic growth, the U.S. GDP will likely level off to where it was before the COVID-19 pandemic, economist Andrew Busch said at the SRP and Phoenix Business Journal’s 2022 Economic Forecast event.
Busch said he expects the U.S. economy’s growth to level off as government stimulus slows and is no longer needed. He said he is expecting about 6% growth in 2021 and between 3.5% and 3.9% in 2022, before leveling off to about 1.8% in the following year.
At the forecast event, Busch said he was confident in the U.S. economy because of how well economic stimulus and policy decisions had worked to steer the economy out of the downturn created by the pandemic.
At one point, there were 23 million people on continued unemployment claims nationally, Busch said.
“Globally, we saw an incredible contraction,” he said. “It was incredibly bad, but it got better really fast.”
Arizona’s challenges for economic growth were similar to many other places in the country, including affordable housing and supply chain issues, he said.
