The UK now spends more than 2.4 of GDP on research and development, meeting the government’s target to match the OECD average.
Yet it’s not cause for celebration, as the only thing that’s changed is the measurement. In the real world, nothing has actually changed.
The way we understand the size, growth, and relative success of the economy, and many other facets of life, is through statistics. Good statistics are built on high quality data, which is collected according to agreed definitions and high quality methods.
Sometimes better methods emerge. And sometimes the old methods fail to keep pace with a changing economy. That’s what seems to have happened to the business research and development (R&D) statistics.
