Real gross domestic product – the output of goods and services produced by labor and property located in the U.S. – increased at an annual rate of 2.5 percent in the second quarter of 2013 compared to the first quarter, according to the second estimate released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. In the first quarter, real GDP increased 1.1 percent.
The GDP estimate is based on more complete source data than were available for the advance estimate issued last month. In the advance estimate, the increase in real GDP was 1.7 percent. With this second estimate for the second quarter, the increase in exports was larger than previously estimated, and the increase in imports was smaller than previously estimated.
The increase in real GDP in the second quarter primarily reflected positive contributions from personal consumption expenditures (PCE), exports, private inventory investment, nonresidential fixed investment and residential fixed investment that were partly offset by a negative contribution from federal government spending. Imports, which are a subtraction in the calculation of GDP, increased.
The acceleration in real GDP in the second quarter primarily reflected upturns in exports and in nonresidential fixed investment and a smaller decrease in federal government spending that were partly offset by an acceleration in imports and decelerations in private inventory investment and in PCE.
