Talk:United States economy growth revised up to 0.4% in last quarter of 2012

feedback
Just to put things back to places, as I wasted time reading the thing once already and didn't find it rubbish-bin-worthy at once, I undertook the sin of re-posting this here which the author would have been quite capable of doing himself and should do next time he has feedback on an article here.

"a highly significant international story—again the headline too long, and misleading to boot: United States economy growth revised up to 0.4% in last quarter of 2012 (try US growth 0.4%—and it's not that the 0.1% estimate was "revised" up to a 0.4% estimate: apparently the economy actually grew at 0.4%).

Let's move from the thematic chaos to examine the quality of the US growth story. The mistake concerning successive estimates is reinforced in the story text: "the increased estimate". The story itself is so short it's almost not worth reading; and it lacks the larger context conveyed by the sourced BBC News Online story—"US economy ekes out 0.4% growth ..." (my italics). Fact is, 0.4% is pretty bad given all of the circumstances. I suggest that 2/3 of a page rather than six sentences would be more fitting for a complex main-page feature. And while we're being picky, "the" is missing from the second sentence (and you could probably drop "previously"). A comma after "2012" would be useful, although not mandatory. "Per the report" is not stylish, and isn't the first paragraph "per the report" too? "Hike in taxes" I regard as falling into GOP "tax is robbery" spin – the neutral form is "tax rises". I query why "defense" and "government" spending are different—is this more GOP spin, of the type that holds that military spending is just ticketyboo, but government spending on the health system is socialised medicine? And the amateur economist in me is slightly concerned about the presumption—made in the sources, I suppose—that the "loss in output" is entirely due to these cuts in spending. Methinks it's multi-factorial."

--Gryllida 12:07, 1 April 2013 (UTC)