Site Map
Friday September 3, 2010 
compiled by Christopher Chantrill

SITE
NAVIGATION

Home

Numbers

Breakdown

UK Budget

Budget Pie Chart

Charts

Spending Brief

Debt Brief

Download Year

Download Multi

Download Raw

Tour

Blog/faqs

Ink

About

BUDGET 2008

Public Spending

Defence Spending

Pensions/NHS/ Ed Spending

Projected UK GDP

National Debt

HM TREASURY BUDGET DATA

Budget 2009

Budget 2008

Budget 2007

Budget 2006

Budget 2005

Budget 2004

Budget 2003

Budget 2002

Budget 2001

Budget 2000

Budget 1999

Budget 1998

HM TREASURY PESAS

PESA 2009

PESA 2008

PESA 2007

PESA 2006

PESA 2005

PESA 2004

PESA 2003

PESA 2002

PESA 2001

PESA 2000

PESA 1999

FEATURED SPENDING

COFOG

Expenditure

General Gov.

Health Care

Education

Defence

Welfare

PUBLIC SPENDING
BY YEAR

2011

2010 2009 2008 2007 2006 2005 2004 2003 2002 2001

PUBLIC SPENDING
BY DECADE

2000s spending 1990s spending 1980s spending 1970s spending 1960s spending 1950s spending 1940s spending 1930s spending 1920s spending 1910s spending 1900s spending 1890s spending 1880s spending 1870s spending 1860s spending 1850s spending 1840s spending 1830s spending 1820s spending 1810s spending 1800s spending 1790s spending 1780s spending 1770s spending 1760s spending 1750s spending 1740s spending 1730s spending 1720s spending 1710s spending 1700s spending 1690s spending

SPENDING
BY COUNTRY

Alabama
Alaska
Arkansas
Arizona
California
Colorado
Connecticut
District_of_Columbia
Delaware
Florida
Georgia
Hawaii
Iowa
Idaho
Illinois
Indiana
Kansas
Kentucky
Louisiana
Massachusetts
Maryland
Maine
Michigan
Minnesota
Missouri
Mississippi
Montana
North_Carolina
North_Dakota
Nebraska
New_Hampshire
New_Jersey
New_Mexico
Nevada
New_York
Ohio
Oklahoma
Oregon
Pennsylvania
Rhode_Island
South_Carolina
South_Dakota
Tennessee
Texas
Utah
Vermont
Virginia
Washington
Wisconsin
West_Virginia
Wyoming


    Briefings: 

smaller text  bigger text  print view
 spending|debt|||||||

UK National Debt Charts


A briefing from ukpublicspending.co.uk

Three Centuries of the National Debt

The National Debt was made possible shortly after the Glorious Revolution, when William III arranged to sell debt securities through a syndicate of London merchants. The syndicate became the Bank of England, and the securities founded the National Debt.


Chart 1: National Debt 1900-2011
Click image to customize chart


Chart 2: National Debt 1692-2011
Click image to customize chart

When charted in pounds sterling, in Chart 1, the National Debt looks huge. Looking back over the last century, the debt back in 1900 doesn’t really register. But by charting debt as a percent of gross domestic product (GDP) in Chart 2, you get a look at government debt compared to the size of the economy at the time.

Chart 2 tells, in stark detail, the story of the British Empire. It was built on the National Debt. Throughout the 18th century the National Debt grew and grew, from nothing at the end of the 17th century to about 60 percent of GDP by the end of the War of Spanish Succession in 1715.

In mid-century the Carnatic Wars in India, the Seven Years War against France and the American War of Independence caused another ratchet in National Debt up to 156 percent of GDP in 1784.

But that was just the beginning. The Revolution in France and the subsequent Napoleonic Wars led to another explosion in military spending and the National Debt rose to 237 percent of GDP in 1816 after the battle of Waterloo. The rest of the 19th century was spent in drawing the debt down, to a low of 25 percent of GDP in 1914. That was just before the outbreak of the Great War in Europe.

National Debt since 1900

In the 20th century the UK government has increased the National Debt to fight wars and to mitigate economic troubles.


Chart 3: National Debt 1900-2011
Click image to customize chart

At the beginning of the 20th century in 1900 the National Debt stood at a very manageable 30 percent of GDP and dipped to 25 percent of GDP by 1914 despite the intervening Boer War. But the Great War, World War I, caused an explosion in the National Debt up to 135 percent of GDP in 1919. Then, in the economic troubles of the 1920s it rose to 181 percent in 1923 and stayed above 150 percent of GDP until 1937. The National Debt dipped to 110 percent of GDP in 1940 before soaring to 238 percent of GDP after the close of World War II in 1947.

After World War II the National Debt was slow reduced down as low as 25 percent of GDP in 1992. Thereafter it fluctuated in the 30s and 40s until the financial crisis of 2008. The National Debt is expected to exceed 100 percent of GDP in the aftermath of the crisis.

A Century of Interest Payments


Chart 5: Interest on National Debt 1900-2011
Click image to customize chart

The real risk from government debt is the burden of interest payments. Experts say that when interest payments reach about 12% of GDP then a government will likely default on its debt. Chart 5 shows that the UK is a long way from that risk. The peak period for government interest payments, including central government and local authorities, was in the 1920s and 1930s right after World War I.


There’s More...

ukpublicspending.co.uk. Where you go to get facts about public spending.

 

Prepared by Christopher Chantrill.
email: chrischantrill@gmail.com

 


Headline

PESA 2010 Update


UkPublicSpending.co.uk now shows spending numbers at the subfunction level as released by HM Treasury in its Public Expenditure Statistical Analyses (PESA) 2010.

Spending for 2008-09 is now "outturn"; spending for 2009-10 is now "estimated outturn". Central government spending for 2010-11 is "plans", as estimated by HM Treasury. Local authority spending for 2010-11 is "guesstimated" by UkPublicSpending.co.uk by projecting the change between 2008-09 and 2009-10 forward to 2010-11.

Note: HM Treasury has not released spending estimates at the subfunction level for years after the current fiscal year 2010-11.

News

Budget News

June Budget: VAT rise and benefits cuts
Chancellor Osborne's emergency budget of June 22, 2010.

Millions in the public sector to pay more for pension
Chancellor says "disparity between public and privates sector pensions... 'unsustainable.'"

Announcing £6.2billion savings
Speech by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rt Hon George Osborne MP on May 24, 2010

> archive

Quick Links

Get spending chart.

Download spending table.

Download spending data series.

Review data sources.


Masthead

ukpublicspending.co.uk was designed and executed by:

Christopher Chantrill.

Report bugs here.



Education

“We have met with families in which for weeks together, not an article of sustenance but potatoes had been used; yet for every child the hard-earned sum was provided to send them to school.”
E. G. West, Education and the State