ONS says UK productivity has been stronger than it looked, after revising hours worked

What the ONS changed

On Thursday the Office for National Statistics rolled out a "component approach" that builds hours worked from the ground up, explicitly factoring in time off for holidays, sickness and similar shifts in working patterns. It draws on household and business surveys alongside administrative records. The result is fewer hours on the clock than previously estimated, which lifts productivity per hour.

How the numbers move

The ONS also reports that in 2024 output per hour stood 40.7% above its 1997 level, more than six percentage points higher than the earlier estimate for that span.

What the report says about the puzzle and the pandemic

The revision reshapes, but does not erase, the story that the UK slowed more than many peer economies after 2008. As the ONS puts it, "Under the component approach, improvements to actual hours worked can explain half of the productivity slowdown," since 2008. "The 'productivity puzzle' therefore remains under both approaches, but it is smaller under the component approach framework." During the pandemic, when furlough was concentrated in lower productivity industries, those who continued working saw productivity move back toward its pre‑2008 trend.

Process, timing and implications

According to the ONS, it has been consulting stakeholders on the redesign, among them the UK Treasury, and from November the component approach will be the official measure of productivity. The agency stressed there is no change to current GDP figures. Later this year, once the annual GDP dataset is released, it plans to publish productivity estimates up to the second quarter of 2026 and then incorporate the method into headline statistics.

The update lands amid a run of stronger than expected growth and offers some fiscal breathing room for Chancellor of the Exchequer John Healey as he prepares next month's budget and confronts widening holes in the public finances. It also follows a period when the statistics office came under scrutiny over labor market, prices and GDP data, prompting reviews and aligning with National Statistician Ian Diamond's sudden exit last year for health reasons. His replacement was named last week, over a year after he left the post.

When data shifts our view of the economy, steady investing still protects long term goals. Join Briefs Finance CEO Jaspreet Singh on September 29th for a FREE live investor workshop, How to Profit From A Dollar That's Losing its Value, where he shows how we're spotting investment opportunities as the dollar falls. Save your spot.

A clearer read on how much work actually gets done matters for your wallet too. If workers have been more productive than we thought, that can shape wage dynamics, inflation pressure and the path of interest rates, which flow through to mortgages and savings yields.

A clearer picture of work and output reminds savers to keep a calm growth plan. Our CEO Jaspreet Singh is hosting a FREE live investor workshop, How to Profit From A Dollar That's Losing its Value, on September 29th. Sign up free to join him live.