United Kingdom - Wage & Salaries

The UK balance of payments is a statistical statement designed to provide a systematic record of the UK's economic transactions with the rest of the world. 

The Balance of Payments is one of the United Kingdom's key economic statistics. It measures the economic transactions between United Kingdom residents and the rest of the world. It also draws a series of balances between inward and outward transactions, provides an overall net flow of transactions between UK residents and the rest of the world and reports how that flow is funded.

Economic transactions include:

- exports and imports of goods such as oil, agricultural products, other raw materials, machinery and transport equipment, computers, white goods and clothing;

- exports and imports of services such as international transport, travel, financial and business services;

- income flows such as dividends and interest earned by non-residents on investments in the UK and by UK residents investing abroad;

- financial flows, such as investment in shares debt securities and loans; and

- transfers, which are offsetting entries to any one-sided transactions listed above, such as foreign aid and funds brought by migrants to the UK.

The data are predominantly derived from surveys conducted by the Office for National Statistics and the Bank of England, as well as directly reported data from other government departments (HM Treasury, HM Revenue & Customs) and from other suppliers such as the Bank for International Settlements and the European Investment Bank. Data for trade in goods are derived from information collected by HM Revenue & Customs.

Government departments and others use balance of payments estimates for the following:

• in providing ministerial briefing on the headline Balance of Payments and Trade statistics pre-release
• feeding data into their own regular analyses of the macro economy, and also into more ad-hoc and in-depth analyses. For example, importance of trade with particular countries or groups of countries, importance of trade in different commodities, and or services, identifying comparative advantage, changes in import and export prices, economic contribution from trade and primary income, and looking at inward and outward investment. These analyses and briefings are aimed to inform ministers and decision makers of the current and historical situation, and provide evidence for the policy debate
• balance of payments data are also of interest to a wider range of user groups, including the media, researchers and other regional, national and international policymakers. Some users focus primarily on the developments in the current account and their financing, including the sustainability of the current account imbalances in the longer term and the need for policy adjustments. Others focus on an analytic presentation, classifying its standard components of balance of payments and their relationship to other components (for example trade and direct investment, and foreign direct investment and productivity). The balance of payments allows a sector breakdown of the financial account and their relationship to domestic sources of finance

Data is subject to revisions

More information can be found on: http://www.ons.gov.uk