MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

US economy performance better than expected; expansion in 2012 was 2.8%

Consumer spending accounts for about 70% of US GDP

The US economy grew at an annualised pace of 1.7% in the second quarter of the year, the Commerce Department has said. That was a faster pace than expected by economists. It was also up from the growth rate for the first three months of 2013, which was revised lower to 1.1% from 1.8%.

A slowdown was widely expected due to the impact of federal spending cuts, but also from the continuing weakness in the global economy.

In March, 85bn dollars of public spending was cut as a result of a deal between Democrat and Republican politicians.

But the Commerce Department said that the federal government cut spending by only 1.5% in the April-to-June period, compared with a sharp drop of 8.4% in the first quarter. The US economy grew by 0.4% in the second quarter compared with the previous three months.

That compares to 0.6% growth in the UK in the same period. The Euro-zone's GDP figures are released on 14 August. The 18-member region shrank 0.2% in the first quarter - the sixth quarter of decline in a row.

Consumer spending accounts for about 70% of US GDP. Official figures showed that consumers spent less in the second quarter than in the first, with personal consumption expenditure up 1.8%, compared with 2.3% previously.

As well as the last set of quarterly figures, the Commerce Department also revised growth figures going back several decades.

It said the US economy now grew by 2.8% in 2012, up from its previous estimate of 2.2%. This may help to explain why growth appeared weak last year but hiring continued to improve.

The government also said that the economy contracted by 4.3% during the recession, which lasted from December 2007 to June 2009, better than the previous estimate of a 4.7% drop.

The economy expanded by 8.2% from the middle of 2009 through to the end of last year, which was more than the 7.6% previously suggested.

The latest figures showed a pick up in both imports and exports. Exports rose 5.4% in the second quarter, compared with a drop of 1.3% in the first quarter. Imports jumped 9.5%, compared with an increase of 0.6% in the previous quarter.