Trump Economic Adviser Kevin Hassett Predicts GDP Will See Biggest Drop Since Great Depression

The White House is not sugarcoating it: The second quarter will be a bloodbath for the U.S. economy.

Appearing on CNBC Monday, Kevin Hassett — a senior economic adviser to President Donald Trump — delivered an utterly dire forecast, with much of the nation’s economy shut down due to the coronavirus pandemic. Hassett predicted that the next round of unemployment numbers, out in the first week of May, will show 16-17 percent of the population out of work. And the second quarter GDP could come in as low as -30 percent.

“For second quarter GDP, it’s going to be the biggest negative number that we’ve seen since the Great Depression,” Hassett said. He added, “You’re looking at something minus 20 to minus 30 in the second quarter.”

The projected drop would be, by far, the biggest in decades. The worst single quarter drop of the 2008 crash was 8.4 percent in the last three months of that year.

Still, the projection is actually somewhat rosier than what some economists have forecasted. JPMorgan Chase, several weeks ago, predicted that the GDP could fall by as much as 40 percent.

Hassett believes that there will be something of a quick bounce back.

“The third quarter’s likely to be very positive,” he said.

Watch above, via CNBC.

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