CHART OF THE WEEK

 

The Trump OMB Growth Projections Are Reasonable

 

 

Congressional Republicans and the Trump Administration are adopting tax and regulatory policies to recover U.S. economic potential rather than constrain it. The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) projects real GDP to reach a level by 2028 consistent with what the Obama Administration had projected just five years ago, as it continued to revise down its expectations.

LAST WEEK

News & Commentary Weekly Highlights

Cato: Could CBO Be Underestimating GDP Growth by 1%? They’ve Done It Before

Wall Street Journal: U.S. Home Construction Rose 9.7% in January

Tax Foundation: Introducing the Tax Foundation’s 2018 Tax Reform Calculator

Financial Times: A former Fed insider explains the internal debate over QE3

OMB Release

An American Budget, FY 2019

Top Economic Indicator Highlights

Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization (January 2018)

The Fed’s industrial production index covers nearly everything tangible produced in the United States.

 

Category	Jan	Dec	Nov
Industrial production (year-over-year percentage change)	3.6%	3.4%	3.9%
Capacity utilization (percent of capacity in active use)	77.5%	77.7%	77.5%

 

Noteworthy: For the first month of 2018, industrial production registered another strong gain from the same month of last year.

Consumer Price Index (January 2018)

 

Category (percentage change from same month last year)	Jan	Dec	Nov
Headline CPI	2.14%	2.11%	2.20%
Core CPI (excludes food and energy)	1.85%	1.76%	1.71%

 

Noteworthy: After slowing early-to-mid 2017, core CPI resumed an upward trend in recent months.

THIS WEEK

Upcoming Economic Data

Monday

No releases

 

Tuesday

No releases

 

Wednesday

PMI Composite Flash (9:45am)

Existing Home Sales (10:00am)

Federal Reserve FOMC Meeting Minutes (2:00pm)

 

Thursday

Jobless Claims (8:30am)

Leading Indicators (10:00am)

Kansas City Fed Manufacturing Index (10:00am)

Federal Reserve Balance Sheet (4:30pm)

Money Supply (4:30pm)

 

Friday

No releases