Hacker News

US economy beats forecasts to grow at 3.4% rate in third quarter(ft.com)

25 points by alephnerd 18 hours ago | 14 comments

I love how increased healthcare spending always makes it into the top line of the strongest drivers of growth and example of consumer "willingness" to keep spending.

  Less affluent Americans in particular have been squeezed by higher prices. But Wednesday’s data showed that on the whole, American consumers continued to splash out in the third quarter, with spending on healthcare, food and accommodation rising.

[–] tonyedgecombe 16 hours ago

You would expect that with an aging population.

[–] science4sail 16 hours ago

"Broken windows" economic theory applied to public health!

I imagine that soon we'll see recommendations for seniors to spend their last years in long-term care facilities rather than at home or with their families. After all, it's good for the GDP - we need a way to "mine" all of that Boomer wealth before their heirs can inherit it.

[–] SR2Z 15 hours ago

The "broken windows" approach would imply that the status quo got worse without good reason, and that bringing it back on track is accountable for growth.

Healthcare isn't like that. Human beings are born dying, it's not like the healthcare expenses could be avoided. It's not clean-up fees, it's genuinely productive economic activity by keeping people healthier for longer.

[–] zcw100 16 hours ago

I'm just finishing up the probate process for one of my parents and I'm convinced the banks do everything they can to sabotage the process so they can hang on to that money as long as possible. Taking forever to respond, lengthy round trips that could be avoided with an email, unnecessary serial processes, paperwork with account numbers mysteriously off by one digit, etc

[–] asgh199 17 hours ago

The paper economy. Apparently higher energy prices are an economic stimulant, so if you double the gas prices another time maybe you get 6.8% growth in Q4.

[–] segmondy 17 hours ago

Do we still trust the data coming out from this admin?

[–] Avicebron 17 hours ago

It'll trickle down, any day now

[–] clarle 17 hours ago

I'm trying to not just think about myself being in the tech bubble and all, but a lot of what I've been seeing across many industries are people being laid off or unable to find work.

This includes software engineers in many of the recent layoffs, as well as artists, photographers, and animators I know who have had a significant drop in typical advertising work with the advent of AI. Many of them have switched to gig work like Uber or Doordash, which makes them considered "employed" in employment surveys.

I do understand why the "economy" might grow - reducing expenses while maintaining revenue can definitely do that, but I don't know how long something like this can be sustainable. Eventually you do need consumers to purchase things in the economy and not just circular financing of compute.

I wonder what the final end state is going to look like in a few years.

[–] bwestergard 17 hours ago

"Many of them have switched to gig work like Uber or Doordash, which makes them considered "employed" in employment surveys."

That's true for the classic "U-1" unemployment rate. But the U-6 captures the "marginally attached" as well, and it hasn't shot upward.

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/u6rate

[–] alephnerd 17 hours ago

> as well as artists, photographers, and animators I know who have had a significant drop in typical advertising work with the advent of AI...

Much of this was offshored earlier this decade independent of AI.

The sunsetting of film and art production tax credits and subsidizes in much of North America while the UK, Europe, NZ, India, and Colombia dramatically ramped theirs up meant much of the industry got offshored.

And new media has changed how advertising works. Influencer and guerrilla advertising lands better as it feels more "authentic" amongst consumers. This also reduces spend on traditional advertising and the teams needed to do so.

[–] vinyl7 15 hours ago

Is this inflation adjusted?

[–] jqpabc123 18 hours ago

Driven by massive debt being used for AI/data center build out.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/giacomotognini/2026/10/02/insid...

[–] sparse-Matrix 18 hours ago

I cam here to say, "Let me guess: It's all the AI bubble"