The UK's economy at a glance (1990-2010) in comparison with the U.S and a developing country, Philippines. The 6 major macroeconomic issues that UK is facing today and their rankings (based on their priority) are: GDP/PPP, Productivity, Recessions and Expansion, Unemployment, Inflation and Economic interdependence.

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The U.K economy at a glance (1990 to 2012)
The 6 major macroeconomic issues that UK is facing today and their rankings (based on
their priority) are: GDP/PPP, Productivity, Recessions and Expansion, Unemployment,
Inflation and Economic interdependence.
Of all mentioned issues, GDP is the important indicator for measuring the country's
economy. By 2010, the UK's GDP was UK US$2,261,710; nearly 1/7 that of the U.S, the
biggest economy in the world. Its PPP also lets us know more about the economy and its
people's standard of living. By 2010, the UK's PPP was $US 35,636, this was about 1/3
lower than the U.S and nearly 10 times higher than developing country Philippines. As
estimation, it will take the UK some 7 to 8 years to get to the current US's PPP. And it
likely will take Philippines will few more decades to catch up with the UK today.
As a developed country, UK's productivity or GDP per hour work is quite high: $US 50.8,
ranking 11 in the world; still it's lower than that of the U.S; $US 59. (2009, Source:
http://www.conference-board.org/). When look at Recessions and Expansions or ups and
downs of the economic growth rate we get another view for the country, which have a clear
correlation with other indicators like Unemployment Rate and Inflation.
During the period of 1990-2010, UK's most serious recession in 2009 also marked its year
of high unemployment rate (8%), extremely low inflation (1.65%), decreased PPP (from
$US 35,885 to $US 34,473). This was in same landscape with the world financial crisis and
was illustrated clear with data of the balance of trade of the country. This Balance of trade
(or Economic interdependence) is another issue of importance for the UK (especially when
the world economies are more and more of a connected system that reacts and balances the
countries). Though UK doesn't belong to the EU, over the time, its trade balance showed its
huge deficit net export. This was not as serious as the US but with UK's size of economy
it's unbalanced enough and the country should pay more attention to this.
Finally, there's a minor note regarding population growth rate. Although the world's total
population is rising rapidly, not all countries are experiencing this growth. With .4% UK's
population isn't declining but it's slowing. This might have more implications such as a
falling birth rate and a rising life expectancy but in general, with this rate, there will be
almost no adding to labor force in the future. As population can have certain impact to the
economy, the UK may want to do something to lift it up and to avoid a natural decrease in
population in the future.
In short, UK's economy is one of the strongest economies in the world and its trend of
growing is up slope. With globalization and in today's world landscape, all economies are
connected and linked together, thus, macroeconomic issues becomes more significant. The
time ahead will be a difficult time not only for the world but also for UK, it will have to
find solutions to reduce unemployment rate, maintain its current inflation (4-5%) and
strengthen its economic interdependence.

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(Source of data: downloaded from WorldBank)
POPULATION
Figure 1. Populations of the U.S, UK and the Philippines from 1990 to 2020 (projection)
Over the time of 20 years, UK remained the average birth rate of about .4% (between .2%
and .7%) this was much lower than the U.S with 1.1% and the Philippines with 2%.
By 1990 the population of the UK was about 57,248 mil people, by 2010 it lightly
increased to 62,232 mil people and as estimation, if UK keeps this rate, by 2020 its
population will be some 64,823 mil people.
Similarly, the US, with such rate will increase from 309,649 mil people to some 342,348
mil people by 2020, adding some 32,999 mil people to its labor force.
Philippines makes the biggest change in population; with this 2% of population growth
rate, 19,117 mil Philippinos will be born by 2020 (equal to 20.4% of its population now);
as big as 4 to 5 mega cities with population of 5 mil people each.

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I. GDP
Figure 2. GPD from 1990 to 2010
In general, period time of 1990-2010 showed increasing GPDs for the three countries The
UK, The U.S and The Philippines. By the end of 2010, the biggest economy is the U.S with
US$14,586,700 mil; followed by the UK US$2,261,710 mil and Philippines, US$199,589
mil.
Though the three countries enjoyed a going up trend in GDP growth, the scenarios were
slightly different. Compared to 1990, by 2010 UK's GDP is $1,249 bil USD higher;
whereas same number for the U.S is $8,835 bil USD and the Philippines is US$155 bil.
However, growing sizes weren't the same In 1990, UK's GDP was US$1,012,580 mil; after
20 years, this has increased to US$2,261,710 mil or 2.23 times greater. This is a positive
number but it's not good enough as when compare the same for other two countries, we
have US with 2.54 times greater and developing Philippines with impressive 4.5 times (See
Figure 2).
Figure3. GPD ratios
Comparing the three economies we have another result: in 1990, the size ratio for
economies of UK : U.S : Phil was 1 : 5.68 : .04; by 2010, this has changed to
1 : 6.54 : .09 (Figure 2). This is another indicator to show that the US and Philippines have
better performance than the UK.
In general, the UK's GDP is quite big but the country has the modest performance over
time in comparison with the U.S and the Philippines. The U.S's GPD (2010) was 6.54 times
higher than the UK and the trend showed that it will continue leaving the UK far behind. Of
the three countries, the Philippines' looks like a flat line but its performance was also
impressive (if UK ever had the same performance its result can be amazing!).

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II. Standard Of Living
According to world HDI report (2011), the U.S and the UK were all in Very High Human
Development countries group. The UK has the highest HDI; .91, followed it was the UK.
with .86. The Philippines was recorded with .64, belonged to Medium Human
Development group. For easier comparison, the mean HDI of the world was .66.
Figure 4. UK, U.S and the Philippines' PPPs
Now we will look at the countries' PPP, another indicator for standard of living. By 2010,
the UK's PPP was $US 35,636, this is about 1/3 lower than the U.S with $US 47,153 and
nearly 10 times higher than the developing country, Philippines with $US 3.969. Compared
to each own PPP by 1990, we see that all the three countries have managed to double their
PPP by 2010. Yet, as each country has different starting point so the gaps are huge.
Compared to itself, after 20 years, GPD per capita of the U.S has increased by $US 24,115,
while UK increased by $US 19,353 and the Philippines was way below both with $US
2.216.
In short, the standard of living of UK is fairly high and is tentatively growing higher.
Compared to the U.S, the trend shows that it will take the UK some 7 to 8 years to get to
the current US's PPP; similarly it also will take the Philippines few more decades to catch
up with the UK today.
Figure 4. PPP ratios
Why Philippines's GDP per capita has been doubled just as UK and the U.S but it GDP's line is
increasing with greater angle? This is because of its higher growing rate of country population as
showed in Figure 1, this is a reason why population can contribute greatly to the economy.

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III. Short-term Economic Fluctuations
Figure 5. Short term economic fluctuations
Over the time, two developed countries UK and the U.S seemed to have experienced
similarly close ups and downs. Since 1990, the UK has gone through 11 times of down
fluctuations with the 2 most serious periods were in 1991 (-1.39%) and 2008-2009 (-
4.37%) of GDP growth rate. Compared to its peak of 6.21% in 1997, it was quite a deep
sinking.
Meanwhile, being a developing country the Philippines had a higher average GDP growth
rate, 3.8%, with less down fluctuations (7 times, greater variation), this country managed to
maintain a positive growth rate.
This comes as a warning: the UK's short-term fluctuations were getting more and more
volatile over time. These short-term fluctuations of the UK can stun and slow down the
growth of the country. It affects the GDP and may cost the country few years to climb up
back to where it was before.
Figure 6. GDP growth rate

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IV. Unemployment Rates
Figure 7. Unemployment rates
Philippines had the highest mean of unemployment rate, some 8.9%. Over the time, its
rates have been changing between 7-12%. However in the last 6 years, while other two
developed countries' rates climbed up, the Philippines' has decreased and kept the rate as
low as 7 to 8%, the lowest recorded in its time.
As mentioned the U.S and the UK had the average Unemployment rates of 5.8% and 6.7%
over the time; however they were all climbing up toward the end of the period. (The two
countries' lines were quite close).
In details, unemployment rate of the UK reached its peak in 1992-1994 (10%), it's then
lowered and the country successfully maintained it around 5%. But since 2009 its trend was
to climb up again to around 8%. This is not a good sign for at least 2 reasons. First, it had a
negative correlation with GDP growth, in other words there were more and more people
become jobless while the economy of the country kept going down. Second, the UK is a
developed country with the mean rate of unemployment of 6.7% and it's rarely reaching up
to 2 digits like it is now. 8% might not be too bad for the Philippines but for the UK, it's a
warning sign. The UK should take action to reduce this rate.

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In today financial situation
V. INFLATION
Figure 8. Inflation rate
The Philippines had the highest inflation rate of all. Over the time, its average inflation rate
was 7.49%, there was year that it jumped up to 22% (1998). However, as a developing
country with developing economy this is unavoidable. Since 2000, the Philippines has
managed its inflation rate to under 10%.
Over the time, the UK and U.S experienced a lower inflation with an average of 2.73% for
UK and 2.27% for the US.
I can say these inflation rates were fairly good putting in each country’s scenario.

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VI. Balance of Trade
Figure 9. Balance of Trade or Net Export
Three countries all had trade deficits over the time.
The Philippines, the smallest economy of the three had an almost flat line of Balance of
trade (as compared to other two). Year 1991 marked the highest point of Net export of the
Philippines with only $US -1361 bil, it was a hard year for the country with economic
downturn, high unemployment and inflation. On years with economic growth, the country's
net export showed a bigger deficit.
The U.S is clearly an economy consists of importing more than exporting; with low saving
rate and huge consumption. Since 1994 the U.S has had a trade deficit year on year and the
line got deeper and deeper until 2005. When the economy gets worse the consumption
shrinks and they import less. The chart implied that during period of 2005 -2009, the U.S
has decreased their import nearly by half (by $US 327,354 mil). This uplifted their balance
trade index.
The UK's balance of trade remained quite flatter compared to the US but In difficult times
like in 2009, the UK's balance trade index also tents to go up but as its interdependence is
stronger, the changes weren't showed clearly as the US.