UK productivity remains subdued
As my friend Roger Turner will tell you – going back almost 10 years he identified the productive potential of rural businesses with the right support. We need a shift from sectoral fetishism in economic policy to a spatial understanding of how to grow economies. Until we introduce that economic growth will have shallow roots. This article tells us
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said output per hour rose by 0.3% in the first three months of the year compared with the previous quarter.
It added this measure or productivity had grown by 1.3% in the year to the end of March, the fastest rate of growth since the start of 2012.
But productivity across the whole economy fell slightly, it added.
On Tuesday, the ONS revised UK economic growth up 0.5 percentage points for the year to the end of March to 2.9% and said the economy grew by 0.4% in the first three months of this year.
Official figures last month showed unemployment in the UK had fallen to 1.81 million and average wages rose at their fastest rate in four years.
The ONS tends to focus on output per hour as its main measure of productivity, claiming it is a more comprehensive way of measuring output