Respondents to the January 2020 National Association for Business Economics (NABE) Business Conditions Survey are more bullish about economic growth over the next year than they were in October, according to NABE President Constance Hunter, CBE, chief economist, KPMG. Two-thirds of respondents expect inflation-adjusted gross domestic product (real GDP) to increase by 1.1% to 2.0% over the next four quarters, says Hunter, much like they did in October 2019. However, the share expecting stronger growth jumped from 20% of respondents in October to 31% in the current survey.
On the employment front, there are as many respondents reporting decreases as increases in employment at their firms than in the previous three months, according to NABE Business Conditions Survey Chair Megan Greene, senior fellow, Harvard Kennedy School. She notes that this may be due as much to the difficulty in finding workers – as an increasing number of firms report shortages in skilled and unskilled labor – than to a pullback in growth. According to NABE, about half of the responding firms report raised wages and salaries over the past three months with an even greater share expecting increased pay in the coming quarter.
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