Real GDP up 3.5% 3Q09 (!)

However,

"A large chunk of the gains — 1.66 percentage points — came from Car sales in the form of cash for clunkers; this will not be in the Q4 data.

Home building soared 23.5% — reflecting a combination of zero percent interest rates (ZIRP) and 1st time home buyers tax credit. That was good for another 0.5 percentage points of GDP.

Well over half of the gains are therefore government related."

---Barry Ritholtz, 10.29

Bill: Actually, better than I would have thought, ie, 1.3% of real growth. This is hugely positive, given all the bad news, per the many posts in this blog, and zillions of more elsewhere. Can 1.3% become 1.5%? It seems within spitting distance! (We need about 1.5% real growth to keep pace with population, etc.). Then, we hopefully do more, and, the more we do the more we do. All is still very tenuous, but, to me, this is pretty kewell.