Warren Buffett: 2.2% GDP Growth For Next 100 Years Would Be Nirvana

Warren Buffett has a balanced view on muted current economic reports, such as last week's jobs report. Buffett says he is not surprised there were no more jobs created without a more meaningful pickup in residential construction. "When we see a million residential units constructer annually," he told CNBC's Squawk Box in a live interview, "only then will we see more decent numbers on jobs growth." All is not bad in his eyes, however. Switching to GDP, Buffett does necessarily yearn to see a 4 to 5% print. "That would be unsustainable in the long term," he says. On the other hand, he believes that a 2.2% GDP print is not as abysmal is is being made currently. "If you have a 2.2% growth in annual GDP and have a 1% growth in population, that would be 1.2% increase in real per-capita growth." That, according to Buffet, equates a generational growth of ~20 percent. "That means that every succeeding generation has a 20% better standard of living than the preceeding one," which Buffet thinks is not shabby in the least. "If we were guaranteed 2.2% for the next 100 years," Buffet concludes, "that would be Nirvana!"