In 2024, the gross domestic product (GDP) of the United Kingdom grew by 0.9 percent and is expected to grow by just one percent in 2025 and by 1.9 percent in 2026. Growth is expected to slow down to 1.8 percent in 2027, and then grow by 1.7, and 1.8 percent in 2027 and 2028 respectively. The sudden emergence of COVID-19 in 2020 and subsequent closure of large parts of the economy were the cause of the huge 9.4 percent contraction in 2020, with the economy recovering somewhat in 2021, when the economy grew by 7.6 percent. UK growth downgraded in 2025 Although the economy is still expected to grow in 2025, the one percent growth anticipated in this forecast has been halved from two percent in October 2024. Increased geopolitical uncertainty as well as the impact of American tariffs on the global economy are some of the main reasons for this mark down. The UK's inflation rate for 2025 has also been revised, with an annual rate of 3.2 percent predicated, up from 2.6 percent in the last forecast. Unemployment is also anticipated to be higher than initially thought, with the annual unemployment rate likely to be 4.5 percent instead of 4.1 percent. Long-term growth problems In the last two quarters of 2023, the UK economy shrank by 0.1 percent in Q3 and by 0.3 percent in Q4, plunging the UK into recession for the first time since the COVID-19 pandemic. Even before that last recession, however, the UK economy has been struggling with weak growth. Although growth since the pandemic has been noticeably sluggish, there has been a clear long-term trend of declining growth rates. The economy has consistently been seen as one of the most important issues to people in Britain, ahead of health, immigration and the environment. Achieving strong levels of economic growth is one of the main aims of the Labour government elected in 2024, although after almost one year in power it has so far proven elusive.

With the onset of the Global Financial Crisis in the late Summer of 2007, the United Kingdom was one of the first countries to experience financial panic after the United States. In September 2007, the bank Northern Rock became the UK's first bank to collapse in 150 years due to a bank run, as depositors reacted to the announcement that the bank would be seeking emergency liquidity support from the Bank of England by lining up outside their bank branches to withdraw money. The failure of Northern Rock was a bad omen for the UK economy and financial sector, as banks stopped lending to each other and to customers in what became known as the 'credit crunch'. Government bailouts, private bailouts By October 2008, many UK banks were facing a situation where if they did not receive external assistance, then they would have to default on their debts and likely have to declare bankruptcy. The UK's Labour government, led by Prime Minister Gordon Brown, announced that it would provide emergency funds to stabilize the banking system, leading to the part or full nationalization of some of Britain's largest financial firms. Specifically, Royal Bank of Scotland, Lloyds TSB, and HBOS received over 35 billion pounds in a government cash injection, while Barclays opted to seek investment from private investors in order to avoid nationalization, much of which came from the state of Qatar. The bailouts caused UK government debt ratios to almost double over the period of the crisis, while public trust in the financial system sank.

Graph and download economic data for OECD based Recession Indicators for the United Kingdom from the Peak through the Trough (DISCONTINUED) (GBRRECM) from Feb 1955 to Sep 2022 about peak, trough, recession indicators, and United Kingdom.

Yearly citation counts for the publication titled "Fiscal Policy Responses to the Economic Crisis in the UK and the US".

The government of the United Kingdom borrowed approximately 2.6 percent worth of its GDP in the 2024/25 financial year, compared with 2.3 percent in 2023/24. In 2020/21, government borrowing reached 11.6 percent of GDP, due to increased financial support to public services during the COVID-19 pandemic, combined with reduced revenue because of societal lockdowns.

The United Kingdom's economy grew by 1.1 percent in 2024, after a growth rate of 0.3 percent in 2023, 5.1 percent in 2022, 8.5 percent in 2021, and a record ten percent fall in 2020. During the provided time period, the biggest annual fall in gross domestic product before 2020 occurred in 2009, when the UK economy contracted by 4.6 percent at the height of the global financial crisis of the late 2000s. Before 2021, the year with the highest annual GDP growth rate was 1973, when the UK economy grew by 6.5 percent. UK economy growing but GDP per capita falling In 2022, the UK's GDP per capita amounted to approximately 37,371 pounds, with this falling to 37,028 pounds in 2023, and 36,977 pounds in 2024. While the UK economy as a whole grew during this time, the UK's population grew at a faster rate, resulting in the negative growth in GDP per capita. This suggests the UK economy's struggles with productivity are not only stagnating, but getting worse. The relatively poor economic performance of the UK in recent years has not gone unnoticed by the electorate, with the economy consistently seen as the most important issue for voters since 2022. Recent shocks to UK economy In the second quarter of 2020, the UK economy shrank by a record 20.3 percent at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Although there was a relatively swift economic recovery initially, the economy has struggled to grow much beyond its pre-pandemic size, and was only around 3.1 percent larger in December 2024, when compared with December 2019. Although the labor market has generally been quite resilient during this time, a long twenty-month period between 2021 and 2023 saw prices rise faster than wages, and inflation surge to a high of 11.1 percent in October 2022.

Government spending in the United Kingdom was approximately 44.7 percent of GDP in 2024/25, compared with 39.6 percent in 2019/20.

Massenarbeitslosigkeit und soziales Elend prägten Anfang der dreißiger Jahre das Leben breiter Bevölkerungsschichten in den von der Weltwirtschaftskrise betroffenen Industriegesellschaften. Den zeitgenössischen Politikern und staatlichen Institutionen stellte sich die Lösung dieser Probleme als innenpolitische Hauptaufgabe. Dabei waren sie auf die Mitarbeit der großen wirtschaftlichen Interessenverbände der Arbeitgeber und der Arbeitnehmer angewiesen. Dies galt im europäischen Kontext auf Arbeitnehmerseite insbesondere für die deutsche und britische Gewerkschaftsbewegung, die die mit Abstand stärksten Organisationen im Internationalen Gewerkschaftsbund (IGB) stellten. Die deutschen und britischen Gewerkschaften entwickelten eine Vielzahl an Vorschlägen und Forderungen zur Beseitigung der Arbeitslosigkeit, die in der vorliegenden Studie vergleichend dargestellt werden. Dabei steht der jeweilige Dachverband – auf der einen Seite der Allgemeine Deutsche Gewerkschaftsbund (ADGB), auf der anderen Seite der Trade Union Congress (TUC) – im Mittelpunkt der Betrachtung. Die vergleichende Analyse der gewerkschaftlichen Arbeitslosenpolitik fragt darüber hinaus nach dem jeweiligen Beitrag der beiden Organisationen zum Erhalt der politischen Stabilität in ihrem Land. Die vorliegende Untersuchung zur gewerkschaftlichen Arbeitslosenpolitik in der Weltwirtschaftskrise lässt sich in zwei größere, thematische Teilbereiche aufspalten. Der eine umfasst die politische und gesellschaftliche Entwicklung, die Frage nach Radikalisierungstendenzen in der Bevölkerung, den Machtverhältnissen in Staat und Gesellschaft, der Repräsentation gesellschaftlicher Interessen im politischen Bereich, der Veränderung der demokratischen Institutionen. Den zweiten Bereich bilden die wirtschaftliche Entwicklung, die wirtschaftspolitischen Handlungsspielräume von Staat und Gewerkschaften und insbesondere die Frage nach den Durchsetzungs- und Erfolgsmöglichkeiten einer alternativen Konjunkturpolitik.In dem ersten Abschnitt stellt Claudia Kaiser die Strukturen und die Entwicklung der Arbeitslosigkeit in ausgewählten Statistiken für das Deutschland und Großbritannien dar. Der zweite Abschnitt zeichnet zunächst ein Gesamtbild der ökonomischen Entwicklung und widmet sich daran anschließend der staatlichen Wirtschafts-, Finanz- und Sozialpolitik. Der dritte Abschnitt beschäftigt sich mit den organisatorischen Handlungsspielräumen des ADGB und des TUC in der Weltwirtschaftskrise. Hier werden insbesondere auch die Mitgliederentwicklung und der Organisationsgrad der gewerkschaftlichen Dachverbände berücksichtigt. In dem vierten Abschnitt werden die deutschen und britischen Arbeitsbeziehungen diskutiert. Die Auseinandersetzung der Gewerkschaften mit dem politischen Extremismus folgt im fünften Abschnitt. Der sechste Abschnitt umfasst die programmatischen Reaktionen auf die Weltwirtschaftskrise (Konjunkturpolitik und Planung). Themen Datentabellen in HISTAT (Thema: Erwerbstätigkeit): Tab. 1 Arbeitslosigkeit im Deutschen Reich und im Vereinigten Königreich (1921-1928)Tab. 2 Arbeitslosigkeit als Anteil an der gesamten Erwerbsbevölkerung: Deutsches Reich, Vereinigtes Königreich, USA (1920-1938)Tab. 3 Entwicklung der Bruttoanlageinvestitionen im Deutschen Reich und im Vereinigten Königreich (1925-1932)Tab. 4 Öffentliche Ausgaben im Vereinigten Königreich und im Deutschen Reich (1925-1939)Tab. 5 Bruttoanlageinvestitionen des privaten, öffentlichen und halböffentlichen Sektors zu konstanten Preisen von 1930 in Großbritannien (1920-1938)Tab. 6 Wohnwirtschaftliche Bruttoanlageinvestitionen des privaten, öffentlichen Sektors in Deutschland (1925-1934)Tab. 7 Mitgliederentwicklung, Organisationsgrad und Parteimitgliedschaft im Trade Union Congress (1918-1939)Tab. 8 Mitgliederentwicklung und Organisationsgrad in den Freien Gewerkschaften (1918-1932)

This statistic shows the responses that adults from the United Kingdom (UK) gave when asked "To what extent do you agree or disagree with the following statement: 'The economic crisis has damaged my confidence in business as a whole'" as of June 2014. A large share of respondents (** percent) felt that the economic crisis had damaged their confidence in business as a whole, and a third of respondents felt neutral to the question.

Extensive research has been conducted on the concept of jobless recoveries and their potential causes, primarily focused on the United States from the 1990s. This paper finds that the prolonged employment downturn following the brief 1980-1981 recession in Britain qualifies as a jobless recovery and then investigates possible contributing factors: labor reallocation across industries, regional employment changes, and job polarization. The United States, which did not have a jobless recovery from the early 1980s recession, is taken as a comparison case. I find that the leading candidate explanation for this jobless recovery was the reallocation of labor across industries. This suggests an important role for structural change in the early 1980s recession and in jobless recoveries more generally.

With the collapse of the U.S. housing market and the subsequent financial crisis on Wall Street in 2007 and 2008, economies across the globe began to enter into deep recessions. What had started out as a crisis centered on the United States quickly became global in nature, as it became apparent that not only had the economies of other advanced countries (grouped together as the G7) become intimately tied to the U.S. financial system, but that many of them had experienced housing and asset price bubbles similar to that in the U.S.. The United Kingdom had experienced a huge inflation of housing prices since the 1990s, while Eurozone members (such as Germany, France and Italy) had financial sectors which had become involved in reckless lending to economies on the periphery of the EU, such as Greece, Ireland and Portugal. Other countries, such as Japan, were hit heavily due their export-led growth models which suffered from the decline in international trade. Unemployment during the Great Recession As business and consumer confidence crashed, credit markets froze, and international trade contracted, the unemployment rate in the most advanced economies shot up. While four to five percent is generally considered to be a healthy unemployment rate, nearing full employment in the economy (when any remaining unemployment is not related to a lack of consumer demand), many of these countries experienced rates at least double that, with unemployment in the United States peaking at almost 10 percent in 2010. In large countries, unemployment rates of this level meant millions or tens of millions of people being out of work, which led to political pressures to stimulate economies and create jobs. By 2012, many of these countries were seeing declining unemployment rates, however, in France and Italy rates of joblessness continued to increase as the Euro crisis took hold. These countries suffered from having a monetary policy which was too tight for their economies (due to the ECB controlling interest rates) and fiscal policy which was constrained by EU debt rules. Left with the option of deregulating their labor markets and pursuing austerity policies, their unemployment rates remained over 10 percent well into the 2010s. Differences in labor markets The differences in unemployment rates at the peak of the crisis (2009-2010) reflect not only the differences in how economies were affected by the downturn, but also the differing labor market institutions and programs in the various countries. Countries with more 'liberalized' labor markets, such as the United States and United Kingdom experienced sharp jumps in their unemployment rate due to the ease at which employers can lay off workers in these countries. When the crisis subsided in these countries, however, their unemployment rates quickly began to drop below those of the other countries, due to their more dynamic labor markets which make it easier to hire workers when the economy is doing well. On the other hand, countries with more 'coordinated' labor market institutions, such as Germany and Japan, experiences lower rates of unemployment during the crisis, as programs such as short-time work, job sharing, and wage restraint agreements were used to keep workers in their jobs. While these countries are less likely to experience spikes in unemployment during crises, the highly regulated nature of their labor markets mean that they are slower to add jobs during periods of economic prosperity.

In 2023 and through 2024, the world saw inflation rates increase amid, among other things, post-COVID-19 effects and the Russia-Ukraine war. Argentina and Turkey were both plagued by hyperinflation, with over 219 and 58 percent in 2024, respectively. Except for these, Russia had the highest inflation rate, at nearly eight percent. On the other hand, China had the lowest rate of the countries included here, at 0.2 percent. Argentinian inflation crisis During the 2020s, Argentina was struck by extreme levels of inflation, which severely impacted the livelihoods of Argentinians. Specifically, the costs of goods have presented numerous challenges to Argentinian consumers. In Argentina, a basic food basket that costs around 26,000 Argentinian pesos cost over 100,000 by February 2024. Similarly, a basic consumer goods basket that cost around 57,000 Argentinian pesos in February 2023 rose to over 220,000 by February 2024. While these rising costs have been challenging for consumers, Argentina’s inflation rate is expected to decrease beginning in 2024 and is estimated to reach 8.9% by 2029.

British recession Besides the outliers of Argentina and Turkey, the United Kingdom had a comparatively high CPI rate. As of 2024, the British economy has entered a recession, the only G7 country to do so. Just before the general election held in July 2024, British voters indicated that health, mostly the lack of financial support and staff shortages, as well as the economy was the most important issue to them.

Bankruptcies in the United Kingdom increased to 2029 Companies in October from 1995 Companies in September of 2025. This dataset provides - United Kingdom Bankruptcies - actual values, historical data, forecast, chart, statistics, economic calendar and news.

The gross domestic product of the United Kingdom in 2024 was around 2.78 trillion British pounds, an increase when compared to the previous year, when UK GDP amounted to about 2.75 trillion pounds. The significant drop in GDP visible in 2020 was due to the COVID-19 pandemic, with the smaller declines in 2008 and 2009 because of the global financial crisis of the late 2000s. Low growth problem in the UK Despite growing by 0.9 percent in 2024, and 0.4 percent in 2023 the UK economy is not that much larger than it was before the COVID-19 pandemic. Since recovering from a huge fall in GDP in the second quarter of 2020, the UK economy has alternated between periods of contraction and low growth, with the UK even in a recession at the end of 2023. While economic growth picked up somewhat in 2024, GDP per capita is lower than it was in 2022, following two years of negative growth. UK's global share of GDP falling As of 2024, the UK had the sixth-largest economy in the world, behind the United States, China, Japan, Germany, and India. Among European nations, this meant that the UK currently has the second-largest economy in Europe, although the economy of France, Europe's third-largest economy, is of a similar size. The UK's global economic ranking will likely fall in the coming years, however, with the UK's share of global GDP expected to fall from 2.16 percent in 2025 to 2.02 percent by 2029.  

Note: If you use the data in these replication files for any reason, you are required to cite the publication in the European Review of Economic HistoryDespite a substantial body of literature on the severe unemployment crisis in interwar Britain, our understanding of its distributional impacts remains limited. Using newly-digitized government data, this paper analyzes the gender, industrial, and regional composition of unemployment 1923–1936. I find that the unemployment rate was higher for men owing in part to a strongly gender-segmented labor market, that unemployment was widespread across industries and not just a product of the declining staple industries, that unemployment exhibited strong seasonality, and that regional unemployment differentials cannot be primarily attributed to regions’ varying industrial compositions. These results offer a more granular view of this mass unemployment episode.

The UK economy shrank by 0.1 percent in September 2025 after reporting zero growth in the previous month. Since a huge decline in GDP in April 2020, the UK economy has gradually recovered and is now slightly larger than it was before the COVID-19 pandemic. After the initial recovery from the pandemic, however, the UK economy has effectively flatlined, fluctuating between low growth and small contractions since 2022. Labour banking on growth to turn around fortunes in 2025 In February 2025, just over half a year after winning the last general election, the approval rating for the new Labour government fell to a low of -48 percent. Furthermore, the Prime Minister, Keir Starmer was not only less popular than the new Conservative leader, Kemi Badenoch, but also the leader of the Reform Party, Nigel Farage, whose party have surged in opinion polls recently. This remarkable decline in popularity for the new government is, in some part, due to a deliberate policy of making tough decisions early. Arguably, the most damaging of these policies was the withdrawal of the winter fuel allowance for some pensioners, although other factors such as a controversy about gifts and donations also hurt the government. While Labour aims to restore the UK's economic and political credibility in the long term, they will certainly hope for some good economic news sooner rather than later. Economy bounces back in 2024 after ending 2023 in recession Due to two consecutive quarters of negative economic growth, in late 2023 the UK economy ended the year in recession. After not growing at all in the second quarter of 2023, UK GDP fell by 0.1 percent in the third quarter, and then by 0.3 percent in the last quarter. For the whole of 2023, the economy grew by 0.4 percent compared to 2022, and for 2024 is forecast to have grown by 1.1 percent. During the first two quarters of 2024, UK GDP grew by 0.7 percent, and 0.4 percent, with this relatively strong growth followed by zero percent growth in the third quarter of the year. Although the economy had started to grow again by the time of the 2024 general election, this was not enough to save the Conservative government at the time. Despite usually seen as the best party for handling the economy, the Conservative's economic competency was behind that of Labour on the eve of the 2024 election.

Who experienced income and work hour changes, and/or job loss during the Great Recession? Differences relative to uneducated men aged between 45 and 50 and living in London.

The purpose of this study was to provide descriptive data on the changing nature of inequality and its perception, especially with reference to social class and social mobility.
This study formed part of the Comparative Project on Class Structure and Class Consciousness at the University of Wisconsin, Madison.

United Kingdom Weekly Household Exp: Avg: CF: Clothing: Accessories: Crash Helmet data was reported at 0.000 GBP in 2016. This records a decrease from the previous number of 0.100 GBP for 2015. United Kingdom Weekly Household Exp: Avg: CF: Clothing: Accessories: Crash Helmet data is updated yearly, averaging 0.000 GBP from Dec 2006 (Median) to 2016, with 11 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 0.100 GBP in 2015 and a record low of 0.000 GBP in 2016. United Kingdom Weekly Household Exp: Avg: CF: Clothing: Accessories: Crash Helmet data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by Office for National Statistics. The data is categorized under Global Database’s UK – Table UK.H023: Average Weekly Household Expenditure.

Real household disposable income per person in the United Kingdom is expected to grow by 2.6 percent in 2024/25, with disposable income growth slowing from that point onwards. In 2022/23, disposable income fell by two percent, after falling by 0.1 percent in 2021/22, and 0.3 percent in 2020/21.