A view if public access areas of Trump Tower Andrew Lichtenstein/Getty Images

Trump’s 3% Growth for the 1%

Even if US President Donald Trump hits his growth targets in 2018 and 2019 – and he just might – only the stock market may be cheering. Policies that produced more broadly shared and environmentally sustainable growth would be far better than policies that perpetuate current distributional trends and exacerbate many Americans’ woes.

CAMBRIDGE – US President Donald Trump has boasted that his policies will produce sustained 3-4% growth for many years to come. His prediction flies in the face of the judgment of many professional forecasters, including on Wall Street and at the Federal Reserve, who expect that the US will be lucky to achieve even 2% growth.

But is there any chance that Trump might be right? And if he is, to what extent will his policies be responsible, and will faster growth entail grave long-term costs to the environment and income inequality? The stock market may care only about the growth rate, but most Americans should be very concerned about how growth is achieved.

Trump’s forecast for the United States’ overall economic-growth rate is hardly wild-eyed. A steady stream of economic data suggests that the annual rate has now accelerated to 2.5%, roughly splitting the difference between Trump and the experts. Moreover, employment gains have been robust during the first six months of Trump’s presidency, with more than a million jobs created, and stocks are soaring to new highs, both of which are fueling higher consumption.

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