The Office for National Statistics (ONS) has revised its GDP figures for the first quarter to show that the economy shrunk more than was previously believed as the third lockdown hit hard. The MailOnline has the story.
Data published by the ONS showed that U.K. gross domestic product (GDP) is estimated to have decreased by 1.6% in the period between January and March.
That is up slightly on the original estimate of a 1.5% reduction.
It means that the level of GDP now stands at 8.8% below where it was in the fourth quarter of 2019 before the coronavirus pandemic hit, revised from an initial estimate of 8.7%.
Despite the economic dip in the first three months of 2021, household saving levels again returned to record highs.
The household saving ratio – the estimate of the amount of money that households can put away – increased to 19.9% in the first quarter.
That is the second highest ratio ever recorded and compares with 16.1% in the final three months of 2020…
The ONS said that household spending fell in the first quarter of this year as lockdown prevented families from spending money in restaurants and non-essential shops.
Spending in restaurants and hotels dipped by 37.2% on the previous quarter.
The ONS said that the dip in GDP was largely driven by contractions in the education, wholesale and retail sectors caused by the tightening of coronavirus curbs.
The closure of schools and the return of pupils learning at home hit the economy particularly hard.
Education output shrank by 14.7% in the first quarter of 2021 which “reflects the relatively low level of school attendance in January and February because of the closure of schools as part of the Government response to the coronavirus pandemic”.
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