Economic growth rate slows to 2 percent as supply chain issues take toll

The U.S. economy grew at a 2 percent rate in the third quarter, its slowest gain of the pandemic-era recovery, as supply chain issues and a marked deceleration in consumer spending stunted the expansion, the Commerce Department reported Thursday.

Gross domestic product, a sum of all the goods and services produced, grew at a 2 percent annualized pace in the third quarter, according to the department’s first estimate released Thursday. Economists surveyed by Dow Jones had been looking for a 2.8 percent reading.

That marked the slowest GDP gain since the 31.2 percent plunge in the second quarter of 2020, which encompassed the period during which Covid-19 morphed into a global pandemic that resulted in a severe economic shutdown that sent tens of millions to the unemployment lines and put a chokehold on activity across the country.