According to the Office of National Statistics, GDP grew by 0.7 per cent in the first quarter of 2006, revised up from 0.6 per cent published last month.
According to their web-site:
In the first quarter of 2006 there is growth in both the production and services industries. Production grew by 0.8 per cent, with manufacturing growing by the same amount. This was the first quarter of manufacturing growth since 2004 quarter four. Services grew by 0.7 per cent within which the financial & business sectors grew by 1.0 per cent. In contrast, growth in the transport, storage and communication industries slowed to 0.3 per cent, with particular weakness in post and telecommunications.
Household expenditure rose by 0.3 per cent, following 0.8 per cent growth in the previous quarter, as expenditure on clothing and footwear and household goods and services fell.
Government final consumption expenditure rose by 0.1 per cent in the first quarter of 2006 and is now 2.1 per cent above the level seen a year earlier.
As you can see from the above graph, GDP is on an upward trajectory again, after the slow-down of last year. Rule of thumb is that employment usually follows, with a lag of a year to eighteen months.
3 comments:
The way I see it is that national rules are increasingly irrelevant in our globalised world. Increasing commodity prices are likely to curtail the economies with limited natural supplies (i.e. UK), with flows of capital in an outward direction. Of course Shell and BP will enjoy themselves, and hopefully savvy pension investors will wet their beak too.
Hence, "Trans-national Corporations".
You need to remember that the UK dominates in one essential global industry - financial services. London increasingly handles most of Europe's foreign exchange transactions, as well as a good chunk of initial flotations for companies as far away as China.
We've now beat New York back into second place (something unthinkable ten years ago). A good deal of that is down to the sensible regulation that Labour put into place - setting up the FSA for instance eliminated the flaws that resulted in regulatory failures under the Tories - eg BCCI, Barings, Equitable Life, pensions mis-selling.
It's important because the City charges the world a fee for handling all their financial transactions - and the treasury taxes the fees. That's what's paying for the NHS and everthing else.
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