"The best you can hope for" is not the same as "good"

I googled 2% growth is good growth. The featured snippet, attributed to Revenue Rocket, says

Most economists generally peg good economic growth in the 2 percent to 4 percent range of GDP, with the historical average around 2.5 percent annually.

You might think that if the range is from 2% to 4% the average would be around 3%, but no.

You might think that if the average is around 2.5% the range would be 2% to 3%, but again no. Or maybe not 2% to 3%, maybe 1% to 4%. But I suppose nobody thinks 1% growth is "good" growth.

I think the 4% number they report is a holdover from times past. At The Balance they say

Many economists place the ideal GDP growth rate at between 2%-3%.

At Marketplace they say

A healthy GDP rate would be about 2 to 3 percent...
The consensus is that once you’ve caught up with the frontier, the high-income countries, it’s harder to grow fast,” Boal said. “Two to 3 percent means we’re growing faster than the population, which is good. That’s how things have been going pretty much in the last 20 years or so.

That's dated January 2019; 20 years puts us back at 1999 or 2000. So the 2% to 3% range holds for say 2000 to the present time.

I looked up average GDP growth rate where the featured article, from Trading Economics, says:

GDP Annual Growth Rate in the United States averaged 3.14 percent from 1948 until 2020...

But if 3.14% is the "average", "good" growth must be more than that.

And if growth has been between 2% and 3% for the last 20 years, then growth in the earlier years must have been higher, to make the average go above 3%.

Currently, Trading Economics says this:

The United States is the world’s largest economy. Yet, in the last two decades, like in the case of many other developed nations, its growth rates have been decreasing. If in the 50’s and 60’s the average growth rate was above 4 percent, in the 70’s and 80’s dropped to around 3 percent. In the last ten years, the average rate has been below 2 percent and since the second quarter of 2000 has never reached the 5 percent level.

Growth in the early years was higher. Now the picture's coming into focus. GDP growth has been declining. And average GDP growth has been declining.

And the growth rate that economists say is "good" growth has also been declining. If you can't fix the economy by making it better, you can always make it sound better by lowering the bar.

Maybe when the pandemic is over economists will start saying 1% growth is good growth.

Me? I say 4% or better is good growth. I'm a holdover from times past.

You want to remember that GDP is a measure of income. If you want more income then you want a bigger share of GDP ... or the same share, from a growing GDP.

When you say we don't need growth you are saying either "I don't want more income", or "I want to make my share bigger by making someone else's share smaller." I don't accept either view. And the idea of making other people's shares smaller so you can have more, that's not a popular view. It's a way of saying inequality is great as long as it's in your favor. But a lot of people are mighty upset about inequality.

I think the only choice is to get more growth. So, for crying out loud, stop lowering the bar on what constitutes "good" growth.