In the short run, the tax law coupled with federal spending acted as a stimulus, a 'sugar rush,' but there are indicators the economy may slow this year.
LORDSTOWN, Ohio — Cheryl Jonesco had a plum job installing backup cameras in the Chevrolet Cruze compact car at the storied General Motors plant here. Her work on the assembly line for the last decade provided the financial means to buy a home while raising her now-teenage daughter.
This area has long been a backdrop for photo opportunities illustrating industrial heartland economic woes. It was less than two years ago that Trump showed up in nearby Youngstown and decried the jobs lost overseas. He famously urged a large crowd:"Don't move. Don't sell your house. ... We're going to get those jobs coming back." Those were welcomed words at the rally, where manufacturing jobs had been disappearing for decades — and still are.
An American flag drapes the hood of the last Chevrolet Cruze as it comes off the assembly line at a General Motors plant where 1,700 hourly positions are being eliminated perhaps for good, on March 6, 2019, in Lordstown, Ohio.In the short run, the tax law coupled with federal spending acted as a stimulus, a"sugar rush," economists say, that helped boost annual economic growth to 2.9 percent last year from 2.3 percent in 2017.
Since the corporate tax cut, growth in business investment has bounced around quarter to quarter, from a robust high of 11.5 percent in the first quarter of 2018 to a weak low of 2.5 percent in the third quarter. Business investment, however, is expected to"slow markedly after 2018," according to CBO.
February may have begun to indicate a slowdown. Manufacturing added only 4,000 jobs after a year in which manufacturing averaged 20,000 new jobs a month, the highest in nearly two decades. But manufacturing remains far below its peak in the 1970s when more than 19 million were employed in factories, driving America's economy.
"It was a double kick to the gut," said Tim O'Hara, who retired at age 59 during last summer's layoffs after 41 years at the plant.
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