The economy is high. Statistics, and consensus.

While the U.S. economy is strong by many measures, high inflation has weighed heavily on Americans and their views of the economy. Republican lawmakers have blamed Biden and congressional Democrats for fueling high inflation through their economic investments, though prices have surged throughout the world since the end of the COVID-19 recession.

Fresh signs of labor market strength reinforced a picture of an economy with broad-based momentum despite rising interest rates.

Layoffs retreated last week and economic growth was stronger than initially reported in the first quarter, the government reported Thursday. Other recent data showed rising new home sales, orders for long-lasting goods and consumer confidence.

“If you look at the data over the last quarter, what you see is stronger than expected growth, tighter than expected labor markets and higher than expected inflation,” Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said Wednesday at a conference in Portugal.

This explains why most Fed officials have penciled in two more interest-rate hikes this year, Powell said.

The Fed has aggressively raised rates for more than a year to combat inflation by cooling the economy, though it left rates unchanged at its meeting this month.

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At the start of the year, many economists forecast a recession to materialize by now. Indeed, consumers, workers and businesses have faced challenges over the past year, with interest rates rising and inflation elevated.

Instead, the economy has continued to grow, even in pockets sensitive to higher interest rates. The housing market is a key example. A historically low number of existing homes for sale has helped push up sales of newly built ones. New home sales rose by double-digits in May, far exceeding economists’ expectations.

“We have systematically underestimated the resilience of the American economy,” said Carl Tannenbaum, chief economist at Northern Trust.

S&P Global Market Intelligence said Thursday that it expects gross domestic product to grow at an annual rate of 1.7% in the second quarter, which ends Friday. That is up from its estimate of 0.8% earlier this month.

GDP grew at a 2% annual rate in the first quarter, revised up from a previously reported 1.3% growth rate, the Commerce Department said Thursday. Stronger consumer spending was a driver behind the upward revision. Consumer spending grew at a 4.2% annual rate in the first quarter, the fastest pace since mid-2021, when the economy was rebounding from pandemic lockdowns.

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Americans splurged on long-lasting goods such as cars in the first three months of the year, with spending on long-lasting durable goods rising at a 16.3% annual rate. Consumer spending on services, which includes healthcare, dining out and traveling, also notched a solid annualized gain of 3.2% in the first quarter.

Jobless claims, a proxy for layoffs, decreased by 26,000 last week to a seasonally adjusted 239,000. Last week’s decline snapped a gradual climb in worker filings for unemployment benefits and suggested that the labor market remains historically tight.

Continuing claims, which reflect the number of people seeking ongoing unemployment benefits, fell by 19,000 in the week ended June 17 to 1.74 million. The figure has trended down since early April, suggesting that job seekers are able to quickly find new employment.

Broadly, the labor market remains resilient despite the Fed’s actions. Employers added a seasonally adjusted 339,000 jobs in May, the most since January, and the unemployment rate remained near historic lows. Job openings exceeded the number of people looking for work in April by millions.

Express Employment Professionals, a staffing agency, sees the job market as robust but cooling somewhat. Many companies are hiring, and demand is particularly strong for some workers, such as plumbers, heating and cooling technicians and similar professionals.

“We’re still seeing that gap in employment where there’s more jobs than candidates,” said Stephanie Miller, Express’s director of talent acquisition and retention.

More prospective job seekers, especially white-collar workers, have sought Express’ placement services in recent months, a sign of cooling in some corners of the labor market. Employers have become a bit less urgent in hiring candidates and more picky about whom they interview, Miller said. Applicants’ searches are more urgent because of a decline in government benefits and increased cost of living, she added.

Robust consumer spending and the solid jobs picture are bolstering the economy.

“The economy still is quite healthy and seems to have some momentum remaining,” said Nancy Vanden Houten, lead U.S. economist at Oxford Economics. “Our forecast is still for the economy to slip into a mild recession, but we think that’s going to come later than we previously thought.”