2019 GUAM Economic Report Regional Center for Public Policy School of Business and Public Administration Maria Claret M. Ruane, Ph.D. Efigenia Rose Barcinas Daniel Cayanan Prairie Rose Garrido Sofia Diane Meneses Jun-Patrick Salalila Kristina C. Sayama, MPA Luisa V. Tenorio Angelina T. Tretnoff, MPA 303 University Drive 2019 Guam Economic Report 1
[email protected] UOG Station, Mangilao, Guam 96913 +1 (671) 735-2501 Regional Center for Public Policy –
[email protected] Publication 12/30/2019 www.uog.edu/sbpa www +1 (671) 735-2501 INTRODUCTION Welcome to the second annual Guam Economic Report published by the University of Guam-Regional Center for Public Policy (RCPP) and funded by the University of Guam-Endowment Foundation and the University of Guam-School of Business and Public Administration International Conference on Business, Economics and Information Technology (ICBEIT) annual conference series. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The 2018 Guam Economic Report, released on December 27, 2018, predicted the following for Guam’s economy in 2019: “There is a good chance that Guam’s economic growth would show a 1% decline from its 2018 level unless the combined consumer and business spending increases.” However, at the University of Guam Economic Luncheon on March 13, 2019, an update was provided to adjust the earlier -1% forecasted growth to a -0.5% forecasted growth of Guam’s economy for 2019. Reasons provided at the time were the increasing visitor arrivals to Guam, with the Japan market making a recovery beginning October 2018 as well as the higher Federal Government spending in Guam, including the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) funding for military construction projects in Guam, for FY2019 compared to FY2018; with the shutdown in December 2018 and January 2019 having no effect in total but only in timing because of the delay in paying Federal Government employees.