The UK economy grew by 0.3% in March despite widespread predictions it would shrink, prompting economists to dust off their congratulations and financial journalists to ask themselves difficult questions about what they are actually measuring.
The surprise growth — which is to say, growth that surprised nobody who has ever watched a government spin a number — has led analysts to a breathtaking conclusion: perhaps the British economy does not need stability, predictability, or the absence of regional military conflict to function. Perhaps it thrives on it.
“This is remarkable,” said one unnamed economist, which is the financial equivalent of saying nothing at all. What is remarkable is that we are treating 0.3% monthly growth as newsworthy when the country is engaged in what can only be described as a significant geopolitical entanglement. That is not resilience. That is denial with better PR.
The mechanics of this growth are instructive in their absurdity. When a nation enters a war — or becomes entangled in one, depending on how much your government trusts your ability to read a map — certain industries experience sudden, artificial demand. Defence contractors hire. Logistics companies move things. Consultants consult about moving things. The service sector, which makes up most of the UK economy, does what it always does: charges money to move other people’s money around while calling it value creation.
None of this is growth in any meaningful sense. It is economic activity, which is what we call growth when we want it to sound less like we are simply rearranging deck chairs on a ship that is sailing toward a war zone.
Consider what the growth actually means for the person reading this. If you work in defence, logistics, or financial services, your sector is probably hiring and your industry contacts are probably calling. If you work in retail, hospitality, or anything that depends on people having disposable income and a sense that the future is not on fire, you are probably experiencing the opposite. The aggregate number — 0.3% — is the average of these two realities, which is why averages are so useful when you want to claim everything is fine.
Wages, meanwhile, have not kept pace with inflation for years. Your mortgage costs more than it did two years ago. Your energy bills are higher. Your train fare is higher. Your coffee is higher. But the economy grew by 0.3%, so congratulations on your share of that growth, which, if you do the math, is approximately enough to buy a slightly better coffee next month.
The real story here is not that the UK economy is resilient. It is that we have built an economic system so divorced from human wellbeing that it can declare victory while people are worried about whether their country is about to become a permanent military installation. We measure growth in GDP — which counts a car crash as economic activity because it generates hospital visits and car repairs — and then act surprised when that number goes up during a war.
Economists have spent the last decade insisting that growth is the solution to everything: stagnant wages, crumbling infrastructure, climate change, social division. Grow your way out of it, they said. Never mind what you are growing, or who benefits, or whether it is actually making anyone’s life better. Just grow.
So here we are. The economy is growing. People are more anxious than they have been in decades. Trust in institutions is collapsing. The future feels uncertain. And the official response is to point at the 0.3% and declare victory.
If this is what economic growth looks like during a war, one begins to wonder what it will look like during peace. Perhaps that is the real message: the UK economy has learned to thrive on chaos because chaos is all it knows how to do. Stability, prosperity, and a future that does not involve military entanglement are not growth drivers. They are obstacles.
So yes, celebrate the 0.3%. Celebrate it loudly. Celebrate it while you can. Because if the pattern holds, the economy will keep growing as long as there are wars to fight, consultants to hire, and GDP to measure. The only question is whether we will eventually notice that we are celebrating the wrong thing entirely.