NEW YORK —Breathe a tiny­ sigh of relief, if not exactly contentment: The US economy grew just barely in the last quarter of 2012.

Output expanded at an annual rate of 0.1 percent, which is basically indistinguishable from having no growth and is far below the growth needed to get unemployment back to normal. But at least the economy did not shrink, as the Commerce Department had estimated last month, when the first report suggested that output contracted by an annual rate of 0.1 percent.