In October the rosy news came in–GDP in the third quarter of 2009 grew at a rate of 3.5 percent. Then to almost no fanfare the first revisions came in November—whoops, it was only 2.8 percent. Well now the 3rd quarter GDP numbers have been revised one more time. As of today, we get a double whoops moment from the government’s Bureau of Economic Analysis. It looks like growth during July, August, and September of this year was only 2.2 percent. If there are no more downward revisions (aka mistakes), it means that the original GDP figure overestimated the growth rate by about 50 percent–hardly a rounding error.
by Locker Room contributor