Britain’s economy will be closer to Guyana than the U.S. in a decade’s time as Sir Keir Starmer fails to meaningfully boost living standards, economists have warned. The Telegraph has more.
The Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) has predicted that Britain’s growth in GDP per head – a proxy for living standards – will be among the weakest in the G7 over the next five years, trailing the US, Japan, Italy and Germany until the end of the decade.
Ranked in cash terms, the UK is on course to remain in 22nd place for GDP per head in 2029 as it is overtaken by both the UAE and Malta.
By 2039, UK GDP per capita is expected to be $86,141 (£68,800), pushing the UK up one place in the global league table. However, this is expected to be closer to Guyana’s GDP per head of $78,695, than the US, where GDP per person is projected to stand at $148,411.
The US is expected to cement its position in fifth place in the world over the CEBR’s forecast as Donald Trump’s deregulation agenda boosts the competitiveness of the world’s biggest economy.
While the CEBR’s measure does not account for inflation, which is a key component when measuring living standards, Pushpin Singh, of the consultancy, said the figures showed Britain risked “falling behind in the global economic race”.
He added that GDP per head was “forecast to lag far behind the US and inching closer to emerging markets like Guyana, highlighting a potential stagnation in living standards under Sir Keir Starmer’s leadership”.
The Prime Minister has made raising living standards across the country a priority during his premiership. However, recent figures suggest it has worsened on some measures since Labour took power.
Sir Keir conceded this month that it “will take some time” before living standards improve, adding that his Government could not fix everything “by Christmas”.
Mr. Singh at the CEBR warned that dire productivity and a ballooning welfare bill since lockdown had helped to swell the size of the state, leading to higher taxes.
He said: “The way the U.K. economy has fared over the last five years, I would say we are much more similar to France than we are to the U.S. One key thing that is driving the U.S. growth is productivity, which has been off the charts since the pandemic.
“U.K. welfare spending is still not as bad as France. But are we on the road there? I think so in terms of elevated welfare spending, tax receipts not being enough to make up for that welfare spending and other spending commitments such as the NHS and other civil service sector spending. And debt as a share of GDP is slowly ballooning up as well.”
Raising productivity is vital to lifting living standards, he said, something Britain’s public sector has struggled with.
“Productivity growth has been a huge issue in the U.K., specifically within the civil service,” he said, noting that public services productivity remains below 1997 levels.
Britain is already on the brink of recession after statisticians revised down the country’s growth figures to zero as Labour swept to power. GDP per person also fell in the three months to the end of September, as surging immigration continues to weigh on this measure.
The Bank of England believes the economy continued to stagnate in the wake of Rachel Reeves’s record tax raid, leaving it dangerously close to slipping into a period of economic decline.
Worth reading in full.
Merry Christmas from Downing Street!
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Kneel has been ordered to destroy Great Britain and by God if he is to achieve anything in his miserable life he is hell bent on this. Short of a miracle I do not see this country surviving 2025 in any sort of cohesive form. Kneel will push through devolution in order to accelerate national fragmentation and the economy surely cannot last the year in a cohesive form so the IMF, BIS and the Vanguard vulture class will move in for some easy pickings.
I would love to own a few slivers of optimism but there appears to be little to be optimistic about.
If one accepts that we have a Uniparty then it would be the same under the fake Tories.
If Mr Singh has not taken account of Net Zero his forecasts must be too optimistic.
Oh!
But both the IMF and OECD have recently lifted their predicted growth figures for the UK economy.
https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/sn02784/#:~:text=OECD%20and%20IMF%20forecasts&text=The%20IMF%20lifted%20its%20forecast,in%202025%20unchanged%20at%201.5%25.
It is difficult to see how Britain’s membership and funding of so many of these international organisations is compatible with a representative democracy whose first duty is to its citizens.
Very little of what our government do is compatible with a representative democracy whose first duty is to its citizens.
The reliability of IMF and OECD forecasts are just as bad the OBR and BoE ones.
To be honest, I find these stories increasingly tiresome.
It’s like hearing a fat person tell how unhappy they are to be fat, but really love food and don’t like to exercise, but hate being fat and wish they weren’t fat, maybe they should start exercising a bit, maybe go on a diet. But you just know they won’t. The behaviour is ingrained and compulsive and will just continue that way.
That is what it’s like reading articles about the UK’s big tax bill, and low competitiveness and bloated state. Blah, blah, blah. People wish it weren’t so but won’t for a minute consider seriously what it would actually take to change that.
St Augustine: O Lord make me chaste and celibate… but not just yet!
Will Keir Starmer’s destructive policies survive beyond 2029 or swept away by a Reform UK Government?
Will Two Tier Kier survive until 2029 himself?
Not a chance.
Yes indeed. No Government may bind its successor.
I think they are being too generous to Germany as they are ahead of us in crushing their economy with Net Zero.
Deliberate Destruction of Britain – Communist Britain Crumbles
“Sir Keir Starmer fails to meaningfully boost living standards”
Can someone explain how a government can “boost living standards”?
I have observed many ways in which governments can depress living standards.
They can boost living standards by the simple expedient of reducing taxes.
But that would involve reducing the size of the public sector.
And, unfortunately, these wretched, control psycho creatures view the public sector as their private fiefdom.
As a consequence, they have been captured by the public sector, whose interests they now conflate with their own.
It may very well take some kind of seismic upheaval to restore the spirit of selfless public service that we once took for granted.
After all, we only got to that place twice in the last century, following the worst two sequential wars that the world has ever experienced.
I guess my point was that they can boost prosperity indirectly by doing less and letting people get on with what people do, which is to be productive. Sadly that’s not how a lot of people think of this issue.
I share your pessimism.
I totally agree with the first half of your comment that is exactly the problem.
For me the problem started with the 1914 war, and metastasis in the second, and the rolls Royce civil service came out of it believing their own hype.
The success of the appollo program which of course had nothing to do with Whitehall but was interpreted as further proof that the big state can do anything despite the obvious damage closer to home.
By the 70s the UK was running on vapours and Thatcher was able take baby steps in the right direction, swept away by Blair and continuity Blair which brought us to where we are now with a massive and still growing state, getting more and more malevolently incompetent not bothering any longer even to hide their contempt of us.
It’s grim for sure, but we survived in 1940 and we’ll manage this time as well, although the collateral damage will exceed anything the luftwaffe achieved.
GDP per head is not helped by immigration
I agree to some extent, but there are different kinds of immigrants. There are those who have ambition and talent, who come here because they have an opportunity to put that talent to work, and in the process drive up GDP for the country as a whole. And then there are those who sneak into the country illegally, get involved in low-paid jobs for cash, at best, or live off the proceeds of crime, at worst, make no contribution to the country through their taxes and live at the expense of the honest taxpayer. Sadly, I think the former are more likely to leave the country than move here under the current high-tax regime.
The overwhelming lack of condemnation of the autumn budget and its chilling effect on the economy, in contrast to the outcry over the Truss-premiership mini-budget, says everything you need to know about impartiality in the MSM.