Poll: Economists foresee weak but improving growth

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CHICAGO — Economists foresee only tepid growth for the coming year, with unemployment back above 8 percent for the first half of 2013.

The good news: The housing market is recovering faster than expected and the economy likely won’t fall off a “fiscal cliff.”

The quarterly survey by the National Association for Business Economists released Monday predicts growth will be weak overall but should slowly accelerate through 2013.

The 44 economists surveyed now see gross domestic product — the value of all goods and services produced in the United States — rising just 1.9 percent in 2012 before reaching a 3 percent pace by the fourth quarter of next year.

Employment growth is forecast to weaken. The panel predicts that the unemployment rate will rise to 8.1 percent by the end of the year. The economy should add an average of 125,000 jobs per month during the fourth quarter, down from the economists’ May forecast of 190,000 jobs.