Data. That's it. That's how we're going to start. From American Public Media, this is Marketplace.

In Los Angeles, I'm Kyle Rizzdahl. It is Thursday. Today, this one's the 27th of March. Good as always, to have you along, everybody.

The big question about this economy right now isn't will he or won't he on the tariffs. The right answer could honestly be both because it almost doesn't matter. The threats, the flip-flopping on some

of them, the prospect of more, we're just sitting here waiting for the real economic fallout

to start. Have I mentioned, oh, by the way, that the stock market is not the economy? No, the big

question about this economy right now is how big the hit is going to be.

That's the setup for the big picture economic data point of the day,

an updated reading on how fast this economy is growing.

An annualized rate of 2.4% in the last quarter of last year we learned this morning,

which is solid, not spectacular, but solid.

But consider this. That's where the economy was heading into this year. And that ain't the story anymore, as Marketplace's Sabree Benishore explains.

2024 was kind of the end of the post-pandemic party. Not a hangover. Just, you know, the party

kind of died. No more pent-up demand. Government stimulus mostlyover. Just, you know, the party kind of died.

No more pent-up demand. Government stimulus mostly done. Jonathan Pingel is Chief U.S.

economist for UBS. And that massive wave of growth, that sort of peaked in 2023 with over

3% GDP growth, had kind of slowed to about 2 and a half percent in 2024.

So at the beginning of this year, it looked like 2025 was also going to be all about a gradual slowdown.

But now the slowdown is looking a little less gradual.

Pingel took his estimate of growth this year down from 2 percent to closer to one and a half percent.

You are reaching the point where the tariff actions are becoming less of an inflation concern

and more of a longer-term growth risk concern.

Brett Ryan is senior U.S. economist at Deutsche Bank.

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