LONDON – The British economy recorded its biggest contraction in more than three centuries in 2020, according to official estimates, highlighting the economic weight of the Covid-19 pandemic in a country that has also suffered one of the deadliest outbreaks in the world.
While the UK is facing a new highly contagious variant of the coronavirus, Prime Minister Boris Johnson hopes a quick vaccination will allow a gradual reopening of the economy in the coming months, paving the way for a consumer-driven rebound later in the year.
Gross domestic product fell 9.9% for the year as a whole, the National Statistics Office said on Friday, the largest annual decline among the Group of Seven Advanced Economies. The French economy shrank by 8.3% and that of Italy contracted by 8.8%, according to provisional estimates. German GDP fell 5%. The US fell 3.5%.
According to data from the Bank of England, the UK’s GDP decline in 2020 was the largest in more than 300 years, although the preliminary estimate is likely to be revised. BOE data show that the economy recorded a comparable decline in 1921, when it fell by 9.7% during the post-World War I depression. The economy contracted further in 1709, when it fell 13% during an unusually cold winter. Great frost.
Britain was especially affected in the second quarter of 2020 when a national closure occurred. Social distancing and the closure of restaurants, bars, hotels and theaters were painful for the economy, where a higher share of national income is spent on recreational and similar services that require face-to-face contact than in other comparable economies.