Q1 2016 Gross Domestic Product By Industry

EMBARGOED UNTIL RELEASE AT 8:30 A.M. EDT, Thursday, July 21, 2016

BEA 16—38

Gross Domestic Product by Industry: First Quarter 2016

Construction Led Growth in the First Quarter
Construction; health care and social assistance; and retail trade were the leading contributors to the increase in U.S. economic growth in the first quarter of 2016. According to statistics on the breakout of gross domestic product (GDP) by industry released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis, 11 of 22 industry groups contributed to the overall 1.1 percent increase in real GDP in the first quarter.

For the construction industry group, real value added—a measure of an industry’s contribution to GDP—increased 9.0 percent in the first quarter, after increasing 7.6 percent in the fourth quarter of 2015. This was the eighth consecutive quarterly increase.

Health care and social assistance increased 3.8 percent, after increasing 2.1 percent. The first quarter growth primarily reflected an increase in ambulatory health care services, which includes offices of physicians and outpatient care centers.

Retail trade increased 4.8 percent, after increasing 0.3 percent

Other highlights

• Real GDP growth slowed to 1.1 percent in the first quarter, from 1.4 percent in the fourth quarter. Information services was the leading contributor to the deceleration in real GDP. Real value added for the industry group increased 4.9 percent, after increasing 10.6 percent in the fourth quarter. The deceleration was primarily attributed to a slowdown in broadcasting and telecommunications.
• Wholesale trade was the second leading contributor to the deceleration, decreasing less than 0.1 percent after increasing 3.5 percent.
• Transportation and warehousing decreased 8.8 percent, after decreasing 2.9 percent, primarily reflecting a larger decrease for air transportation.

Gross output by industry

Real gross output—principally a measure of an industry’s sales or receipts, which includes sales to final users in the economy (GDP) and sales to other industries (intermediate inputs)—increased in the first quarter. This reflected increases in real gross output for both the private goods- and services-producing sectors, as well as the government sector. Overall, real gross output increased in 16 of 22 industry groups.

Real gross output for construction increased 14.5 percent, after increasing 4.9 percent in the fourth quarter.

Information services increased 2.3 percent, after increasing 10.8 percent, primarily reflecting growth in the motion picture and sound recording industry.

Health care and social assistance increased 7.3 percent, after increasing 1.5 percent. The increase reflected growth in both ambulatory health care services and hospitals.

Upcoming Annual Revision of the Industry Economic Accounts

The annual revision of the industry economic accounts, covering the first quarter of 2013 through the first quarter of 2016, will be released along with the estimate of quarterly GDP by industry for the second quarter of 2016 on November 3. All revisions will be fully consistent with the results of the annual revision of the national income and product accounts, which will be released on July 29.

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Next release – November 3, 2016 at 8:30 A.M. EDT for:
Gross Domestic Product by Industry: Second Quarter 2016
Annual Revision of the Industry Economic Accounts

Additional Information

Resources

Additional resources available at www.bea.gov:

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• Historical time series for these estimates can be accessed in BEA’s Interactive Data Application
• For more on BEA’s statistics, see our monthly online journal, the Survey of Current Business
• BEA's news release schedule
• Access BEA data by registering for BEA’s Data Application Programming Interface (API)
• Industry Concepts and Methods: Concepts and Methods of the U.S. Input-Output Accounts