New federal data shows that Connecticut’s $284.3 billion economy grew at one of the slowest paces in the country during the second quarter.
That data released Thursday by the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis came paired with some other relatively bad news — the state’s economic growth during 2018 was only half of what officials had previously estimated. The BEA revised its 2018 Connecticut estimate downward, to 0.5 percent, compared to 1 percent growth announced back in May.
Meanwhile, Connecticut’s gross domestic product (GDP), or the inflation-adjusted market value of goods and services produced by labor and properties, climbed by just 1 percent in the April-June period this year, ranking 47th nationally, BEA said.
The agency said GDP increased in all 50 states and Washington, D.C., at an average of 2 percent. The percent increase in GDP during the second quarter ranged from 4.7 percent in Texas to 0.5 percent in Hawaii.
The relatively weak growth followed a stronger first quarter, in which Connecticut’s GDP outpaced the national average, 4.3 percent vs. 3.1 percent. Though Connecticut lost ground in the recent quarter, it’s still outpacing U.S. GDP growth for the first half of 2019, 5.3 percent vs. 5.1 percent, according to BEA data. However, the rest of New England has performed better than Connecticut during the first half.
In New England, second-quarter GDP grew at an average of 1.3 percent, led by Massachusetts and Rhode Island (1.5 percent), New Hampshire (1.4 percent), Vermont (1.3 percent), Connecticut and Maine (0.6 percent).
Other than Maine, Connecticut’s GDP growth bested Maryland (0.7 percent) and Hawaii (0.5 percent).
Connecticut’s modest economic gain during the period was mainly driven by the finance and insurance (0.38 percent), and professional scientific, and technical services (0.37 percent) sectors.
The so-called “information” and utilities sectors also pushed the state’s GDP upward by 0.32 percent and 0.24 percent, respectively.
