American Economy and Economic Growth

negative territory: The good news is, those assessments were a little too pessimistic, according to MSNBC. The bad news is, economic growth is far short of what we’d like to see. Several forecasts raised the specter of a flat report – an economy that is neither growing nor contracting – and some even suggested GDP would slip into negative territory. The American economy barely grew last quarter, finishing the year much as it had started and stoking concern about its momentum in 2016. Some of this is the result of a sharp drop in oil prices, which affects business investment, and economic troubles abroad, most notably China, which affects domestic trade. Overall, the economy expanded at an annual rate of just 0.7 percent in the fourth quarter of 2015, the Commerce Department said Friday. (news.financializer.com). As reported in the news.