英国英国月度GDP追踪：英国经济增长势头强劲，衰退压力再现.pdf

“Monthly GDP grew by 0.1 per cent in February 2024, with contributions from all major sectors except

construction following a revised 0.3 per cent growth in January. In the three months to February, GDP

growth was 0.2 per cent, higher than what we forecasted last month. On the back of exiting a shallow

recession in 2023, this seems to be a turning point, but in a broader perspective, the UK economy has

flatlined since 2022. Increasing productivity will be a constant challenge that requires structural

changes and long-term spending commitments to public investment and infrastructure."

Hailey Low

Associate Economist, NIESR

Main points

Economic setting

In our previous GDP tracker, published in March, we observed that GDP grew by 0.2 per cent in

entered a technical recession in the second half of 2023. Based on this data alongside higher-

frequency data, we forecast GDP to grow by 0.4 per cent in the first quarter of 2024.

revision 0.3 per cent growth in January. Looking at the broader picture, GDP grew by 0.2 per

cent in the three months to February relative to the previous three-month period. We now

forecast GDP to grow by 0.4 per cent in the first quarter of 2024. Our early forecast for the

second quarter of this year sees GDP growing by 0.3 per cent. These forecasts remain broadly

consistent with the longer-term trend of low, but stable economic growth in the United

Kingdom (Figure 1). In fact, looking at the longer-term picture, GDP growth has been near zero

since early 2022 and GDP per head remains lower than its pre-Covid levels. This outlook for

economic growth is quite low by historical standards (Figure 2).

To further contextualise the near-term outlook for GDP, figure 3 compares spending and hiring

indicators to pre-pandemic levels, while figure 4 records recent trends in PMIs. High frequency

credit and debit card spending as well as housebuilding indicators have been on a gradually

upwards path throughout the first quarter of this year. At the same time, the services PMI

continues to suggest growth in the service sector, though it fell slightly from 53.8 in February to

53.1 in March. Further, the recent ONS retail sales data suggest that retails sales volumes

remained flat in February after rebounding by 3.6 per cent in January. The S&P Global/CIPS UK

Composite PMI – which combines comparable services and manufacturing indices – decreased