Moving the U.S. Economy Out of First Gear

Heather Boushey gives recommendations for getting the economy going again in The Washington Post's "Blue Sky" series.

We are now nearly a year into what economists call a recovery, but it doesn’t look like one to U.S. workers. A close look at the data shows that while the U.S. economy is no longer in reverse, it is having a hard time getting out of first gear.

The U.S. economy continues to have a significant output gap: Capacity utilization is at 75 percent—meaning that a full quarter of our machines are sitting idle—while 1 in 10 workers sits at home. We need to find a way to connect the workers who want to work with the idle machines, be those desktops or assembly lines. What we need is a continued injection of demand—demand for goods and services that will put businesses into motion to start investing and hiring again.

The above excerpt was originally published in The Washington Post. Click here to view the full article.

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