Economics

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The Size of UK Government Debt

Geoff Riley

2nd August 2022

The size of the national debt is one of the important macroeconomic numbers studied by economists.

Debt represents the cumulative amount the government owes to domestic and overseas creditors

The latest figures show that in March 2022, UK government debt was £2,365 billion

This is equivalent to 99.6% of gross domestic product.

UK debt is currently 11.8 percentage points above the EU average

Should we be worried about government debt equal to 100% of the UK’s GDP?

Debt interest payments were £19 billion in June 2022 alone.

A quarter of UK government debt is index-linked, so the cost of paying interest is pushed up by inflation, which in the UK is currently at a 40-year high.

Geoff Riley FRSA has been teaching Economics for over thirty years. He has over twenty years experience as Head of Economics at leading schools. He writes extensively and is a contributor and presenter on CPD conferences in the UK and overseas.

@tutor2uGeoff