Donald Trump held up lifeless economic growth as evidence that America isn’t great anymore during the Republican primary debate in Miami.
“GDP (gross domestic product) was zero essentially for the last two quarters,” he said. “If that ever happened in China, you would have had a depression like nobody’s ever seen before. They go down to 7 percent, 8 percent, and it’s a national tragedy. We’re at zero, we’re not doing anything.”
Assuming that Trump was talking about growth in GDP and not the real gross domestic product (which was more than $18 trillion in the last quarter of 2015), his statement that it’s zero is an exaggeration.
In reality, GDP grew at an annual rate of 1 percent in the fourth quarter of 2015, and 2 percent in the third quarter, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis.
Percent change
GDP in dollars
2015, Q4
1.0
$18.15 trillion
2015, Q3
2.0
$18.06 trillion
2015, Q2
3.9
$17.91 trillion
2015, Q1
0.6
$17.65 trillion
2014, Q4
2.1
$17.62 trillion
2014, Q3
4.3
$17.52 trillion
2014, Q2
4.6
$17.27 trillion
2014, Q1
-0.9
$16.98 trillion
Compared to China’s 6.9 percent in 2015, that may seem like scant growth. But it’s not zero, nor is it historically low — a point Trump tried to make and flubbed in his June 2015 presidential announcement speech.
“The last quarter, it was just announced, our gross domestic product … was below zero. Who ever heard of this? It’s never below zero,” he said back then.
We rated that claim Pants on Fire, noting that economic growth dipped below zero no less than 42 times since 1947.
Trump doesn’t have the new talking point down, either.
Our ruling
Trump said, “GDP was zero essentially for the last two quarters.”
Economic growth in the last two quarters of 2015 was modest: 1 percent and 2 percent. But that’s not zero.
We rate Trump’s claim False.
Truth-o-meter Ruling
Statement
"GDP was zero essentially for the last two quarters."
Context
the Miami GOP debate.Speaker/Target
Statement Date
Our Sources
CNN, Transcript of the Republican debate in Miami, full text, March 10, 2016
PolitiFact, "Donald Trump gets claim about U.S. GDP doubly wrong," June 16, 2015
Bureau of Economic Analysis, "Table 1.1.1. Percent Change From Preceding Period in Real Gross Domestic Product," accessed March 10, 2016
St. Louis Federal Reserve, Gross Domestic Product, accessed March 10, 2016
New York Times, "Fact Checks of the 12th GOP Debate," March 10, 2016
Translations
Language: en