Forecasters are increasingly upbeat about the economy’s prospects, according to The Wall Street Journal’s latest quarterly survey of business and academic economists.

The following graphics show what economists are thinking and how their predictions—and the economy—have changed over recent months and years. After looking at the charts, see whether you can guess what the economists said about the two main presidential candidates and manufacturing employment.

What the economists said

We asked survey respondents a number of questions. Here is how their answers stack up, both now and three months ago—followed by three questions for readers to answer.

A slightly cooling labor market

With inflation easing, the labor market has increasingly become the focus of anyone trying to read the economy. Here, the expectations of economists were roughly in line with what they said in a Journal survey in July.

They continue to believe the unemployment rate will clock in at about 4.2% at the end of this year. The rate was 4.1% in September, according to the Labor Department’s latest jobs report.

They also expect the U.S. to add about 130,400 jobs a month on average over the next 12 months—basically unchanged from their July forecast of 130,900.

These forecasts show that economists do expect further cooling in the labor market, which has been slowing down this year. But they don’t see unemployment rising dramatically.

A cheerier outlook for GDP

The U.S. economy has consistently defied predictions of a recession over the past couple of years, even as the Federal Reserve aggressively raised interest rates.

Last month, the central bank cut rates by a half-point in a bid to keep the labor market and economy on an even keel. The Journal’s survey opened about two weeks later. 

The forecasts of economists show they expect lower rates to have their intended effect: They now predict faster growth for the rest of this year compared with their July forecasts.

Cooling inflation

Bringing down inflation has been the Fed’s main focus over the past couple of years, and inflation has indeed eased greatly in 2024. But some analysts believe that inflation could still get stuck at a too-high level. 

Even so, economists remained confident that inflation will continue to cool in the quarters ahead. This chart shows their forecasts for the core reading of the personal-consumption expenditures price index. The PCE is the Fed’s preferred inflation reading; the core index shown here strips out the volatile food and energy prices.

Lower interest rates

Similarly, economists sharply lowered their forecasts for short-term interest rates. 

The Fed’s September rate cut brought the benchmark federal-funds rate to a range between 4.75% and 5%. Economists in the October survey see this rate at 4.4% at the end of this year, implying two further, quarter-point moves. In the July survey, economists had predicted this rate would be 4.9% at the close of 2024.

Economists also expect rates to sink faster in the years ahead, compared with what they were expecting in July.

Whom we talked to

The Journal has been publishing consensus forecasts from a panel of academic, business and financial economists for more than 40 years. This survey was answered by 66 economists. Not every economist answers every question.