OECD hikes US growth forecast, sees UK recession

0 Comments | AFP, September, 2008

PARIS (AFP) — The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development on Tuesday raised its forecast for US economic growth this year but cut its estimates for Japan and the eurozone, and said Britain faced recession.

The OECD, the Paris-based grouping of 30 developed countries, said the US economy would expand 1.8 percent in 2008, a sharp upward revision from a prediction in June of 1.2 percent.

Japan would grow 1.2 percent instead of 1.7 percent and the eurozone would expand 1.3 percent instead of 1.7 percent, the organisation said in an interim assessment of leading OECD countries.

The combined Group of Seven nations -- Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States -- would grow 1.4 percent, unchanged from the last analysis by the...