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Friday March 29, 2024 
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UK Public Spending As Percent Of GDP

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Use the table below to change the data series


You can display a maximum of five data series at once.

Spending Units: By default, public spending is displayed in billions of pounds. By using a dropdown control in the table heading you can select £ bln (2018), and percent of GDP.
Chart Title: You can create a title for your chart. Use the title text box to enter a title and click the button to the right of the text field.
UK or Country: By default, the chart shows overall United Kingdom government spending. But you can select spending for individual countries by selecting the country dropdown control in the table heading.
View: There are two ways to view the spending data. The default view breaks down spending into functions. There is also a COFOG view that categorizes spending using the UN standard methodology.
General Help: You can use controls on the table below to change the following variables: spending units—e.g. percent of GDP, etc.— and year. You can select the HM Treasury Budget fiscal year.
Line/Bar: By default, the data series are displayed as line charts. But you can also select a bar chart.
Data Stack: By default, the data series are “stacked” when displayed on the chart. But you can change the setting to “un stack” the data series.
Chart Size: By default, the chart is displayed at medium size. But you can use the dropdown control to change the size.
Color: By default charts are displayed with color data lines and fill. You can change this to grayscale if you want.

Data Range

Start Year: You can select any start year you want using the dropdown control in the table heading. At the top and bottom of the dropdown only years ending in “0” are shown. Select a start year to get close, then select the start year you want.
End Year: You can select any end year you want using the dropdown control in the table heading. At the top and bottom of the dropdown only years ending in “0” are shown. Select an end year to get close, then select the end year you want.
Category (max 5)Sub-categoryCentral 
Gov.
General 
Gov.
Local 
Auth.
Total   
 
Data Series: You can select up to five data series to display on your chart. Click on a checkbox to add or delete a data series from the chart. Once you get to five data series you will have to delete a series before you can add one. Click a [+] expand control to drill down to more detailed data series.
 *
 
 All Categories
* If you add data series at same government level, this item will be shown as Remaining Spending.

If you’d like to create your own custom chart of spending data you should use the table above to make your selections.

  • Select the year range: Select the start year and the end year you want by selecting the years you want in the two year dropdown boxes.
  • Select spending items: Just select the spending item you want from the dropdown control. Then click a radio button to select the level of government: federal, state, or local. If you select from the < select > you will add another data series to your chart. Up to 5 data series are allowed at once. Click the “X” link to remove a data series from the chart.
  • Select units: You can select the display in billions of nominal (i.e. inflated) pounds, billions of real (i.e. year 2018) pounds, or as percent of GDP.
  • Choose chart features: You can select the size of the chart, switch from bar chart to line chart, select color or black and white, stacked or not. You can also blow up the chart to fill the screen with the “fullsize” tab control above the chart display.

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Download Data File

 

Click button to download CSV file of dataset in chart.

Download Tab-delimited Data

Copy and Paste: Here is the dataset you have just charted. The table also includes nominal or chained GDP for each year charted. If you’d like the data for analysis, just copy the tab-delimited text in the textbox below (click cursor in text box, then press ctrl-A then press ctrl-C) and paste it into your spreadsheet.

View Data Series

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Below is a formatted version of the dataset displayed in the chart. Included is a column of nominal or chained GDP for each year charted.

UK Public Spending As Percent Of GDP
Fiscal Years 1900 to 2010
YearInflationGDP-UK
£ billion nominal
Population-UK
million
Total Spending -total
percent GDP
19004.09MW gdp41.15514.06a
1901-1.38MW gdp41.53817.17a
1902-1.04MW gdp41.89318.31a
1903-0.25MW gdp42.24718.38a
1904-1.1MW gdp42.61116.37a
19050.48MW gdp42.98117.75a
19061.4MW gdp43.36115.17a
19071.58MW gdp43.73814.47a
1908-0.74MW gdp44.12414.81a
1909-0.35MW gdp44.52014.74a
19101.44MW gdp44.91615.97a
19110.58MW gdp42.19014.99a
19122.61MW gdp42.37414.83a
1913-0.17MW gdp42.58214.99a
1914-0.8MW gdp42.95715.65a
191514.36MW gdp41.36225.84a
191614.76MW gdp40.53651.46a
191724.35MW gdp39.78156.74a
191816.79MW gdp39.58258.09a
191915.24MW gdp42.94452.48a
192016.64MW gdp43.64633.51a
1921-8.17MW gdp43.90434.35a
1922-14.46MW gdp44.33236.71a
1923-7.53MW gdp44.56330.42a
1924-2.09MW gdp44.88627.44a
1925-0.26MW gdp45.04027.40a
1926-0.42MW gdp45.21830.16a
1927-1.94MW gdp45.43229.82a
1928-0.89MW gdp45.62229.43a
1929-0.84MW gdp45.73128.48a
1930-0.84MW gdp45.88929.64a
1931-1.83MW gdp46.07432.33a
1932-2.24MW gdp46.33533.38a
1933-1.39MW gdp46.52032.21a
1934-0.87MW gdp46.66629.47a
19350.79MW gdp46.86928.81a
19360.89MW gdp47.08128.89a
19373.46MW gdp47.28928.86a
19382.36MW gdp47.49429.13a
19392.88MW gdp47.54829.48a
194011.13MW gdp46.02930.13a
194111.47MW gdp44.87054.98a
19427.49MW gdp44.32360.96a
19434.44MW gdp48.26265.79a
19445.01MW gdp48.46067.06a
19451.63MW gdp48.66972.27a
19462.81MW gdp48.98866.76a
19479.08MW gdp49.53950.66a
19486.3MW gdp50.03341.10a
19493.18MW gdp50.33137.65a
19501.34MW gdp50.38237.50a
19518.55MW gdp50.28739.30a
19527.1MW gdp50.42940.22a
19531.83MW gdp50.59339.44a
19541.13MW gdp50.76537.35a
19554.92MW gdp50.94635.55a
19567.04MW gdp51.18435.31a
19574.08MW gdp51.43034.57a
19583.71MW gdp51.65334.88a
19590.76MW gdp51.95635.17a
19601.11MW gdp52.37334.92a
19613.88MW gdp52.80736.94a
19623.65MW gdp53.29237.64a
19631.55MW gdp53.62537.47a
19643.79MW gdp53.99137.43a
19656.06MW gdp54.35038.35a
19665.42MW gdp54.64338.81a
19673.05MW gdp54.95941.97a
19684.44MW gdp55.21441.68a
19696.76MW gdp55.46139.75a
19709.9MW gdp55.63238.52a
19718.57MW gdp55.92838.55a
19727.9MW gdp56.09737.40a
19739.37MW gdp56.22337.37a
197415.8MW gdp56.23642.35a
197525.7MW gdp56.22644.79a
197616MW gdp56.21642.71a
197714.17MW gdp56.19038.76a
197812.32MW gdp56.17838.69a
197914.97MW gdp56.24038.59a
198019.7MW gdp56.33040.00a
198112.31MW gdp56.35840.04a
19828.16MW gdp56.29140.11a
19835.78MW gdp56.31637.80a
19845.33MW gdp56.40937.20a
19855.62MW gdp56.55436.41a
19864.62MW gdp56.68435.51a
19875.69MW gdp56.80433.18a
19886.25MW gdp56.91631.25a
19898.03MW gdp57.07729.27a
19908.12MW gdp57.23830.03a
19916.56MW gdp57.43930.93a
19923.16MW gdp57.58532.33a
19932.79MW gdp57.71433.77a
19941.4MW gdp57.86233.54a
19952.5MW gdp58.02533.99a
19964.22MW gdp58.16433.54a
1997-0.07MW gdp58.31432.40a
19981.07MW gdp58.47531.93a
19990.97MW gdp58.68431.99a
20001.89MW gdp58.88631.10a
20011.15MW gdp59.11332.16a
20022.15MW gdp59.36632.76a
20032.45MW gdp59.63733.47a
20042.59MW gdp59.95034.54a
20052.78MW gdp60.41335.30a
20062.88MW gdp60.82735.60a
20072.76MW gdp61.31935.53a
20083.07MW gdp61.82436.64a
2009-0.261584.562.26140.00a
20101.321561.962.76043.10a

Legend:
a - actual outturn

Data Sources for 1900:
GDP: Measuring Worth - UK GDP
Spending: B.R. Mitchell, British Historical Statistics
Debt: B.R. Mitchell, British Historical Statistics

Data Sources for 2010:
GDP: OBR EFO supp. economy tables
Spending: HM Treasury PESA
Debt: OBR Public Finances Databank

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Make your own CUSTOM CHART.

Spending Data Sources

Expenditure data since 1983 comes from HM Treasury’s Public Expenditure Statistical Analysis reports.

Detailed table of spending data sources here.

Gross Domestic Product data comes from measuringworth.com.

Central government spending data begins in 1692.

Local authority spending data begins in 1868.

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On July 19, 2023, HM Treasury published its Public Expenditure Statistical Analyses (PESA) for 2023. ukpublicspending.co.uk uses the PESA tables of public spending at the "sub-function" level as its major data source for UK public spending.

ukpublicspending.co.uk has now updated its spending tables using data from PESA 2023. The update includes outturn spending data for 2022-23, and plans data for 2023-24, and 2024-25. ukpublicspending.co.uk uses PESA's Table 6.4 for Central Government expenditure, Table 7.4 for Local Authority expenditure, and Table 8.3 for Public Corporation capital expenditure.

Since HM Treasury does not provide plans estimates for future Local Authority spending, ukpublicspending.co.uk provides "guesstimates" instead. This is done by extending the percentage increase in spending between 2021-22 and 2022-23 for each sub-function for the plans year. It is assumed that local authority spending reductions will not carry through to plans years.

Country and Region spending has been updated up to 2021-22. These are obtained from Chapters 9 and 10 in the PESA document.

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