U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) growth in the first quarter of 2012 came in at 2.2%, down from the three-percent GDP growth of the fourth quarter of 2011 (source: Bureau of Economic Analysis). Economists had expected first-quarter GDP growth of 2.2%, so the numbers disappointed. But, in all reality, 2.2% GDP growth is good considering the state of other economies around the world: Europe and the U.K. are officially in a recession, while China is slowing considerably. After two consecutive monthly declines, real disposable personal income in the U.S. (removes taxes and inflation from income to provide a better gauge of a consumer’s real purchasing power) increased by a mere 0.2% last month. So, if consumer spending makes up 70% of U.S. GDP, and there has been no real growth in personal income, how did GDP grow 2.2% in the first quarter of this year? The answer: Consumers dipped into their savings, sending the savings rate to the lowest level since before the crisis, in 2007. There was no strong income growth to justify consumer confidence and GDP growth ; consumers dipped into their savings. I doubt consumers can keep tapping their savings for the remainder of the year to keep GDP growing. The news gets worse. Business investment in infrastructure spending actually declined in the first quarter. So we have the consumer getting into more debt and the job creation engine of business not investing in infrastructure, which means little chance of job creation in future quarters. “Everything’s fine with the U.S. economy and GDP growth,” is what one would believe reading the mainstream media. Be very careful, dear reader. A total of 0.6% of the 2.2% GDP growth in the first quarter came from inventory building. This number was surprisingly high considering how inventory build-up made the fourth-quarter GDP growth numbers look stronger than they actually were. The shelves are full of inventory, but consumers are very indebted and real disposable income is declining, which means consumer confidence will not materialize. The only hope was to create more jobs, but business investment fell in the first quarter. Obviously, U.S. GDP growth in the first quarter outperformed that of many countries around the world, especially considering the fact that the U.K. and many countries in Europe are already back in recession. However, once the U.S. GDP growth figures are looked at closely, there really is nothing to smile or cheer about. We are far from out of the woods with the U.S. economy. Again, many European countries are back in recession. China’s economy is slowing quickly. It will not take much for the U.S.’s already weak GDP numbers to collapse…putting us back into recession much …