Britain’s GDP shrinks 0.2 per cent in Q3; tepid recovery in the US

Britain remains the last major global economy in recession after official data showed the country's output shrank by 0.2 per cent in the third quarter, 0.7% in the three months to June, while the US economy limped forward at a 2.2 per cent pace in the third quarter. (See: US real GDP up 2.2 per cent in Q3 as economy expands slowly)

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said in a statement that the UK's gross domestic product (GDP) contracted by 0.2 per cent during the July to September period, an upward revision to the previous estimate of a 0.3 per cent contraction.

"This has been revised from a fall of 0.3 per cent in the previous estimate of GDP, due to upward revisions to construction partly offset by downward revisions to production and services," it said.

The ONS said that new data showed that the UK had performed worse than originally believed, leaving the economy 5.1 per cent smaller at the end of the third quarter of 2009 than it had been a year earlier.

Since the start of the downturn in early 2008, GDP has dropped by 6.03 per cent, marginally worse than the 6 per cent fall during the manufacturing slump of 1979-81.

This means officially the recession has not yet over.