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Connecticut’s economy grew at an annual rate of 3.3 percent in the three summer months of 2018, the U.S. Commerce Department said Tuesday in a report that buoys optimists who say the long beleaguered state has a turnaround well under way.

The growth in the third quarter, while not spectacular, leaves Connecticut on pace with the nation – which came in at a 3.4 percent growth rate – and in the top half of states, at No. 21 for the quarter.

The number assures that the state’s economy will post a positive GDP gain for all of 2018 when the tally for the fourth quarter comes in this spring. That could be in the range of 2 percent, which is historically where Connecticut has been over the last 30 years.

While that alone might not seem like much to celebrate, it follows two disastrous years for the Connecticut economy, 2016 and 2017, that saw declines in the total output of the state at a time when the nation zoomed ahead.

For the last four reported quarters, starting with a decline of 2.5 percent in the fourth quarter of 2017, Connecticut has posted GDP gains of 1.1 percent, 3.1 percent and 3.3 percent.

In the big picture, from 2007 through the end of 2017, Connecticut’s economy – the total value of goods and services produced – shrank by 9 percent while the national economy, even with the effects of the Great Recession, sped ahead by 15 percent.

That decline, caused by a combination of factors, has left the state with an ongoing fiscal crisis in which, year after year, the governor and General Assembly start with a shortfall that must be made up wither with tax increases, cost cutting, restructuring of debt or financial engineering.

In the long term, economist Donald Klepper-Smith of DataCore Partners said, “our fiscal challenges are first and foremost a function of confidence…Right now people are hesitant to make those commitments based on what they see.”

The good news, Klepper-Smith said, is that Connecticut is certain to post a positive gain for the year. On Monday, before the Commerce Department report, he predicted a 3 percent gain for the quarter, but only about 1 percent for the full year 2018, when the final numbers come out on May 1.