Why the Economic Expansion Still Has Room to Grow

Don’t count this cycle out yet. The recent fiscal and monetary stimulus package may have given new tailwinds to the slow-and-steady growth trajectory that has marked this cycle, according to experts last week at the Burnham-Moores Center for Real Estate’s Breakfast at the BMC Lecture Series at the University of San Diego. Mitch Roschelle, partner and business development leader at PwC, was the featured speaker at the event.

“When you compare this expansion in the U.S. to previous ones, for most of the cycle, we’ve seen slower economic output and job growth on a relative basis,” Roschelle tells GlobeSt.com. “This has picked up somewhat due to the combination of both monetary and fiscal stimulus. The benefit of which has created—for now— tailwinds in our economy outweigh the headwinds, suggesting the expansion has more legs to it.”

Norm Miller, PhD and Hahn Chair of real estate finance at the University of San Diego School of Business, who is affiliated with the Burnham-Moores Center for Real Estate, agrees that we could be in for a extended economic cycle. “A longer economic cycle is possible today because of better regulations and monitoring of the economy, at least when they are working,” Miller tells GlobeSt.com. “We also get information much faster today and that allows businesses to pull back when they see an excess of some type, be it too much vacancy in a certain type of property, or too much inventory coming online.” Information and data collection is possible through both public and private sources, like CoStar, REIS, Moodys, RCA and so on, according to Miller. This data plays an integral role in better addressing supply-demand dynamics that can prevent overbuilding and enhance stability.