That is the premise of a new paper by Peter St. Onge and EJ Antoni. I’ve been looking for a deflator that may yield that US GDP in 2024Q2 is 2.5% beneath 2019Q1 ranges. Primarily based on their dialogue of their paper, in addition to a video by Dr. St. Onge, I have tried calculating a consumption deflator that’s based mostly on home costs and mortgage charges, utilizing the Huge Mac worth (which Dr. St. Onge lauds in his video as an alternative choice to official statistics or PWT knowledge), and quick meals costs (particularly, the meals away from dwelling/restricted providers eating places element of the CPI).
Determine 1: GDP in Ch.2017$ (daring black), utilizing various consumption deflator, housing-in-PCE weights (mild blue), in 2017 quick meals$ (inexperienced), in 2017 Huge Macs (brown), and in 2017% per Antoni-St.Onge (pink sq.), all in billions. Huge Mac costs interpolated linearly. NBER outlined peak-to-trough recession dates shaded grey. Supply: BEA, BLS, NBER, and writer’s calculations.
Deflating by quick meals costs appears to return closest to the Antoni-St. Onge estimate.