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WSJ: Chief executives of large U.S. companies see the economy accelerating modestly in 2015, but are holding steady on their hiring plans, according the Business Roundtable’s first-quarter survey released Tuesday morning.
The CEOs expect gross domestic product to advance 2.8% this year. That would be a pickup from the economy’s 2.4% expansion last year and marks a 0.4 percentage-point increase from the executives’ last projection released in December.
The growth forecast is roughly in line with other estimates. Economists surveyed by The Wall Street Journal in February projected a 2.9% expansion this year. The Federal Reserve forecasts growth between 2.6% and 3%.
The CEO’s “forecast projects expansion, but it’s clear that the economy continues to perform below its potential,” said AT&T Inc. CEO Randall Stephenson, chairman of Business Roundtable. “Absent some fundamental shifts, be it with trade or tax reform…we won’t be able to break through that 3% barrier.”

Horse manure.  Look at it from the percent change in index, we have seen one year, since the crash, in which the index moved at 2.8. And we  already project a drop in the index for this quarter. The index will remain suppressed at least another quarter to handle import growth.  The ten year is up to 2%, a 1/10 rise which suppresses housing.  So most of the 2.8 will have to come in the last two quarters, right in  the middle of recession season with the political liars in full force.