GDP -- Real or Just The First Quarter?

The flash GDP numbers were released this morning for January through March of 2018.  According to government figures, the economy grew at the pace of 2.3% during that time.  This is the first estimate, and refinements will be issued twice in the next two months, and again after a year.  The figure could change by a lot before we get the final number.  Still, looking at today's figure, we have to wonder if the economy is actually growing more slowly in the first quarter or if it is just the government statistics that make it seem that way.  For the last five years, the first quarter GDP reports have all been lower than those for the other quarters.  In 2016, the first quarter growth was a paltry 0.6%.  In 2017, the figure was 1.2%.  Today's figure for 2018 was 2.3%.  That's a big jump from the numbers during the Obama years, but it is still significantly less than the average of more than 3% that has marked the Trump years. 

There has been much speculation in recent years that there is something wrong with the model that the government uses to "adjust" the GDP figures.  This adjustment is seasonal.  For example, there aren't nearly as many farm workers in the winter as there are in the summer, but that doesn't mean that the US GDP has contracted.  It's just a normal seasonal variance.  So the question remains, do government statisticians somehow overly adjust the first quarter down?

By July, we will have a better read on the first quarter's growth.  We won't know, however, if there is a bias in the statistics though.  The feds really ought to look into this.