Georgia\u2019s economic growth could slow down in the new year, University of Georgia economists predict, but Georgia could fare better than the nation as a whole, even as questions loom about the financial policies of President-elect Donald Trump.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The state\u2019s economy is projected to expand by 2.4% next year, down from 3.1% this year, said Terry College of Business Dean Ben Ayers at a 2025 Georgia Economic Outlook presentation in Atlanta Friday. Nationwide, Ayers expects the growth rate to slow from 2.5% on average to 1.6%<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cOn the positive side, we\u2019re expecting again the state of Georgia to outperform the nation,\u201d he said, speaking to a crowd of business leaders at the Georgia Aquarium in Atlanta<\/a>. \u201cAnd the slowdown that we\u2019re expecting will be smaller here in the state of Georgia.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ayers said the major driver of the slowdown is the Federal Reserve\u2019s 2022<\/a> efforts to constrain lending to control inflation. Inflation has dropped from 8% to 3% since then, and the rate is expected to stay at 3% in 2025. The inflation rate at the start of 2020 was 2.3%, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The risk of a recession beginning in 2025 is about one in four, Ayers predicts, which is higher than the baseline of one in six, but an improvement over this year\u2019s odds, which were one in three. Potential risk factors for a recession include an energy price shock, stock market crash or expansion of conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Georgia\u2019s unemployment rate<\/a> is expected to average 4% next year, higher than this year\u2019s 3.7%, but still better than the expected national average of 4.3%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n New jobs are also expected to shrink, from about 1.5% growth to about 1%, again better than the expected national rate of .6%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If you\u2019re looking for work in healthcare home building, 2025 could be the year of your big break<\/p>\n\n\n\n A growing and aging population is expected to bolster health care hiring around the state, while lower mortgage rates, favorable demographic trends and a lingering housing shortage should mean plenty of jobs for home builders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The number of single family homes in Georgia<\/a> is set to go up by 9%, but if you\u2019ve been waiting to buy a home, you may have to keep waiting \u2013 home prices, which have increased by 65% since the pandemic, according to UGA, are expected to hold steady.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Those who work in retail or in information may be at greater risk as competition from online retailers and technological advances squeeze those sectors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n On the campaign trail, Trump pledged to support policies that could reshape the economy in a big league way, including tariffs on imported goods that economists warn could make the stuff Americans buy more expensive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Economist John Silva did not call out Trump by name, but said that if those proposed tariffs become reality, Americans could pay more for products that are not naturally found in the U.S., including auto parts, clothing and types of lumber used for building homes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWhat do tariffs do? They basically raise the price,\u201d said Silvia, Florida-based CEO and founder of Dynamic Economic Strategy. \u201cIn the short run, your inflation numbers<\/a> accelerate because you calculate year over year, but in the long run, prices stay higher than what they were originally. This presents a problem.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe don\u2019t produce bananas in Georgia, OK?\u201d he added. \u201cAnd except for Hawaii, we don\u2019t produce coffee<\/a> in the United States. So you\u2019re going to put a tariff on all these goods, and then someone walks into the grocery store<\/a> and it says \u2018Honduran bananas, plus 15 cents for your<\/p>\n\n\n\n Trump also pledged to deport millions of immigrants<\/a> living in the country illegally. What his actual immigration policy looks like could spell weal or woe for industries like agriculture and construction, Silvia said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe\u2019re not gonna get the job done if you\u2019re gonna tell me all these immigrants have to leave,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s not gonna happen, and it\u2019s not gonna happen in Texas, it\u2019s not gonna happen in California. So what are we going to get in terms of an immigration policy<\/a>? It has to be somehow defined over the next six months to a year, and that policy\u2019s going to define our agricultural output and our manufacturing and construction output over the next two to five years.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Georgia\u2019s economic growth could slow down in the new year, University of Georgia economists predict, but Georgia could fare better than the nation as a whole, even as questions loom about the financial policies of President-elect Donald Trump. The state\u2019s economy is projected to expand by 2.4% next year, down from 3.1% this year, said […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":948,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[16495],"tags":[16703],"class_list":["post-212109","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economy","tag-economy","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212109","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/948"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=212109"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/212109\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=212109"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=212109"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thegeorgiasun.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=212109"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}The Trump Factor<\/h4>\n\n\n\n