According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis of the US Department of Commerce, the country's gross domestic product increased by 5.7% for the whole of 2021 after falling by 3.4% in 2020. Such economic growth has become the most impressive in the last almost 40 years, since the presidency of Ronald Reagan. In the last quarter of 2021, US GDP increased by 6.9% on an annualized basis, which exceeded analysts' expectations of 5.5% growth. In 2020, the American economy shrank for the first time since 2009 (by 3.4%), and the reason for this was the global coronavirus pandemic. However, by the middle of 2021, the economy had recovered and returned to the pre-pandemic level. Analysts note that high economic growth in the United States is accompanied by high inflation – it is also at multi-year highs. In particular, in 2021, inflation accelerated to 7%, which was the largest indicator since 1982. In response, the US Federal Reserve announced that it was curtailing anti-crisis measures, and in March it could raise the base interest rate for the first time in four years. Representatives of the regulator note that a tougher monetary policy is able to restrain price growth significantly exceeding the target level of 2%.
