Fueled by an end-of-year spending spree among American consumers, the U.S. economy grew at a 2.4% rate in the fourth quarter of 2024, the government announced Thursday.
Growth in gross domestic product — the nation’s output of goods and services — decelerated from a 3.1% pace in July-September 2024, according to numbers released by the Commerce Department.
For all of 2024, the economy grew 2.8%, down slightly from 2.9% in 2023.
Consumer spending was up 4% pace, up from 3.7% in third-quarter 2023. But business investment fell, led by an 8.7% drop in investment in equipment, the Associated Press reported.
A drop in business inventories shaved 0.84 percentage points off fourth-quarter GDP growth.
The Federal Reserve’s favored inflation gauge – the personal consumption expenditures, or PCE, price index – rose at an annual rate of 2.4%, up from 1.5% in the third quarter and above the Federal Reserve’s 2% target, according to the AP. Excluding volatile food and energy prices, so-called core PC inflation registered 2.6%, compared to 2.2% in the third quarter.
Thursday’s report was the government’s third and final look at fourth-quarter GDP.
