UK becomes fastest-growing G7 economy | Hacker News Reader

UK becomes fastest-growing G7 economy

apnews.com

11 pointsgeox16 comments

While this is a nice bit of news that is "technically correct," the headline makes it sound like a much bigger deal than it is. One quarter doesn't mean the UK is suddenly taking over the G7.

In Q1, the UK grew at 0.7%, which is slightly more than the expected 0.6% growth and more than the US's 0.3% growth in the same period. But it's also less than Q1 a year ago, which saw 0.9% growth in the UK. And it's nothing compared to the 5.4% growth that China claims in Q1.

These numbers are also pre-US tariffs, which hit some segments of the UK. So growth is expected to be worse in Q2.

Really would've expected AP News to do better with the title. All things considered, this is a statistical rounding error, phrasing this as if the UK is now some powerhouse in its own league is simply misleading.

It tells more about the bad the entire G7 economy is. 0.7% is nothing to be happy about.

Glad to see the businesses are doing well at least since unemployment is at it's highest level in 4 years also.

Isn't this exactly what Thatcher built?

Funny how the current government claims this victory having been in power for less than a year takes credit with lots of photo opps when most decisions taken place in the past 24 months probably led to this position

I wonder how much this has to do with the post brexit's economic slowdown. Like is it a temporary rebound or a new trajectory?

>Like is it a temporary rebound or a new trajectory?

It's in the article: "Sanjay Raja, chief U.K. economist at Deutsche Bank, said the growth uptick will likely be short-lived, especially during the second quarter when trade uncertainty will be at its peak."

It's the biggest (0.7%) since the same quarter last year (0.9%).

my guess is a bit of both

1. due to Brexit but I think also other reasons they had face planted their economy so hard that its very normal to some some "fast growth" after fixing some of the problems

2. there had been a lot of interesting interactions between Russian Oligarch (and their Families) and the UK in the last decades. And this dynamics got affected a lot by the Russian invasion of Ukraine which probably did contribute to the economical crash, but also (indirectly) might have lead to some very wealthy Russians to decide to double down on living in the UK including wrt. spending and investment (note: I'm mainly thinking about successful business people not quite big enough to count as oligarchs and family of oligarchs, i.e. not oligarchs themself as in not people highly involved in Russian power dynamics). But I don't have enough insights about this point to be fully sure about it.

3. One option many countries have is to sacrifice the rights, health and/or future of their citizens for economic grows. E.g. by de-facto removing/reducing worker protections, consumer protections etc.. While this is rarely sustainably long term it tends to work short term and it seems to have at lest slightly happened in the UK, through to some degree in a roundabout way. It's kinda like subventions but instead of paying with money you pay with the future of the people you are supposed to protect. Through sometimes it temporary necessary to get a chance to rebuild a better future then if you hadn't done that. I'm not sure how much this directly benefits the UK but it tends to set a signal for a country to be "investor friendly" which can be beneficial.

What does this mean for UK businesses and startups, is it still a great place to start a company or would the US be better as a european founder?

I think really it means not that much - if you want to start a startup then really you need to think about access to capital and the US is still far ahead there (and growth figures like these don't really change the game.)

Logistics not really much better because you need visas, which the UK govt is now in the process of restricting, unless you're Irish. Access to capital is arguably better than Europe but not better than the US. I guess it could be an option if you want physical proximity to Europe or if you make physical goods for the European market because the UK still has a 0 tariff agreement with the EU.

A lot less than what/where your market & investors are.

I think it means literally nothing for start-ups. It's just a slightly better than expected economic result for one quarter.

As a founder, my experience is that the US is a much easier place to raise capital than the UK or Europe. But your experience is going to vary based on the kind of business you are in and where your customers are located.

I get that the headline is misleading.

Still, is the fact that Britain is doing well a validation of Brexit?

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