Statistics: International Comparisons of Productivity

Statistical bulletin: International Comparisons of Productivity

Released: 18 September 2013 Download PDF

Contents

• Key points
• About this release
• Interpreting these statistics
• Current price productivity
• Constant price productivity
• Revisions
• Background notes
• Statistical contacts

Key Points

• Output per hour in the UK was 16 percentage points below the average for the rest of the major industrialised economies in 2012, the widest productivity gap since 1994. On an output per worker basis, UK productivity was 19 percentage points below the average for the rest of the G7 in 2012.
• UK output per hour and output per worker fell in 2012 compared with 2011. By contrast, these measures both increased in 2012 on average across the rest of the G7.
• In 2012 UK output per hour was 2 percentage points below its level in the pre-recession year of 2007, and 15 percentage points below the counterfactual level had productivity grown at its average rate before the recession.
• This compares with a productivity gap in 2012 of around 5 percentage points for the rest of the G7.

Source: Office for National Statistics licensed under the Open Government Licence v.1.0.