Total expenditure on R&D as a share of GDP, select countries

Between 1991 and 2019, UK R&D spending marginally fell from 1.9% to 1.8% in 2019. During the same period, most of our competitors did the opposite, dramatically increasing investment. If UK R&D spending had kept up with average growth across the OECD between 1999 to 2019, we would have spent an additional £212 billion on R&D over the last two decades.

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