Guernsey · Economy · 1965–2023
Guernsey’s GDP, 1965–2023.
Real growth has averaged well under 1% a year since 2013 — a fraction of the pace the island saw through the 1990s finance boom.
Economic Activity Return
A mandatory Economic Activity Return, established in 2022, enabled a full GDP recalculation back to 2013 - the vintage this chart labels "current".
Real growth, in perspective
Public borrowing, 2013 → 2020
£0 → £0m
The States had never borrowed a penny before 2013. Since then: a £330m bond (2014, maturing 2046) plus a £225m credit facility (2020, COVID-19 response, up to £250m authorised).
Combined agreed capacity, not debt outstanding — the credit facility may be largely undrawn, and the States hold a similar sum in reserve against it.
Real growth per year, 2013–2023
0.0%Guernsey
0.0%Jersey
0.0%OECD average
Compound annual growth, real (inflation-adjusted) terms — Guernsey’s own GVA/GDP Bulletin; Statistics Jersey; World Bank (OECD members). Same method applied to all three.
2023’s growth gap, vs. Jersey’s pace
£0m
Had Guernsey’s economy grown since 2013 at Jersey’s pace instead of its own, 2023’s real GDP would have been ~£643m higher (~£526m against the OECD average). At the States’ own spend-to-GDP ratio, that’s roughly £103m of equivalent spending power — about 2.8× the cost of rebuilding Les Beaucamps High School, or worth over a third (32%) of the States’ entire 5,154-strong workforce for a year.
Illustrative only — GDP output is not government revenue, and this is not a forecast, a Treasury estimate, or a claim that this money existed. See the source note below for the full calculation.
Borrowing: States of Guernsey, debut £330m bond announcement (Dec 2014) and gov.gg/borrowing; Bailiwick Express, “P&R agrees £225m credit facility” (30 Jun 2020). Growth comparison: States of Guernsey GVA/GDP Bulletin 2023; Statistics Jersey, “Jersey’s Economy 2024: GDP and GVA” (published 3 October 2025); World Bank Open Data (indicator NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZG, OECD members) — all compounded 2013–2023 the same way for comparability. 2023 growth-gap and translation: Bridgehead’s own illustrative calculation (full methodology and caveats in economy-urgency-stats.ts) — not a fiscal estimate; Les Beaucamps High School rebuild cost from BBC News.
GDP, 2023
£3,488m
+5% nominal on 2022
Population, Dec 2023
64,781
+1.4% on the year
Public sector employment
8.2–8.4%
of the population
Unemployment, Sep 2024
0.8%
241 people
Median earnings, Jun 2024
£42,672
-0.7% in real terms
GDP: GVA/GDP Bulletin 2023, Table 2.1.1, and historical figures for 1965–2008 supplied by the States of Guernsey Data & Analysis Service (see the chart above). Population: Quarterly Population, Employment and Earnings Bulletin, issued 29 Oct 2024, gov.gg/population (see “Population & demographics” below). Public sector employment: States Accounts 2024 / Bailiwick Express, citing published States data (see “Size of the public sector” below). Unemployment: States of Guernsey, “Unemployment statistics published up until end of September 2024” — 241 jobseekers registered at end of September 2024, a Job Centre snapshot, gov.gg/unemployment-statistics-September-2024. Median earnings: Quarterly Population, Employment and Earnings Bulletin, issued 29 Oct 2024 (same source as Population above) — £42,672 for the year to 30 Jun 2024, +5.3% nominal and -0.7% real on the year earlier.
Income
GDP per capita, 1965–2023
Income per head in money-of-the-day terms and adjusted for UK inflation, across three GDP measurement vintages the States themselves say are not comparable.
Not an official statistic — read before citing
The real-terms (lighter) lines are Bridgehead’s own calculation, not a published States of Guernsey or ONS figure. They deflate the nominal £-per-head values using the UKRetail Prices Index, not Guernsey’s own, because no continuous Guernsey price index reaches back to 1965 — so this line answers “what would this income buy at UK prices,” not “what did it actually buy in Guernsey.” It will disagree with the Bulletin’s own Guernsey-RPI real-terms figures for 2013–2023, and that mismatch is expected, not an error. The 1965–2013 nominal figures also rest on a Bridgehead population estimate, interpolated between real census years — two independent estimates compounding their uncertainty, so treat every pre-2013 figure here as illustrative of scale and direction, not a precise number.
Nominal GDP, all vintages: see the chart above. Nominal GDP per capita, 2013–2023: States of Guernsey Data & Analysis, Guernsey Annual GVA and GDP Bulletin 2023 (First Estimates), Table 2.2.1 — gov.gg/gdp. Nominal GDP per capita, 1965–2013: Bridgehead’s own calculation, dividing that vintage’s published nominal GDP by a population estimate for the same year, interpolated between the States’ own census / Electronic Census figures (gov.gg/census, gov.gg/population) where no annual figure exists. Real (UK RPI): Bridgehead’s own deflation of the nominal figures using the UK Retail Prices Index, ONS series CDKO, “Retail Prices Index: Long run series: 1800 to 2024: Jan 1974=100.”
People
Population & demographics
Current age structure (Q4 2023) and the States' own long-range population projections.
Current structure, Q4 2023
Age structure: States of Guernsey Data & Analysis, Guernsey Quarterly Population, Employment and Earnings Bulletin, issued 29 Oct 2024 — gov.gg/population. Population grew 1.4% (+910) in the year to 31 Dec 2023 (451 births, 605 deaths, net migration +1,064) — growth driven by migration, not natural increase. Projections: States of Guernsey Strategy & Policy / Data and Analysis, Annual Guernsey Population Projection Bulletin, issued April 2023 (latest available; no 2024/2025 edition was published) — under the central scenario, population peaks around 63,950 in 2027 before a slow decline to c.51,550 by 2092; under the States’ upper planning assumption (net migration +300/yr, agreed by resolution in October 2022) it instead rises gradually to c.69,500. Every scenario shows the working-age population (16 to state pension age) declining and the 85+ population more than doubling. Dependency ratios (dependants per 100 working-age adults) rise from 0.56 in 2022 toward a peak of 0.85 by 2083 on the UN definition, or 0.68 by 2088 once the phased rise in state pension age (65→70 by 2049) is factored in.
Housing
Home ownership, house building & prices
Owner-occupation rate and net new homes created per year, 2016–2025 - the full span the States' property-stock system covers on a comparable, year-by-year basis (the underlying data exists from 2010, but 2016 is the earliest year tabulated in the current bulletin format) - plus mix-adjusted purchase and rental price trends since 2021, the full window the States' own quarterly bulletin reports against.
61.2% owner-occupied
2025, essentially flat since 2016 (60.1%). 26.3% of units are privately rented, 8.6% Affordable social rented and 1.0% Affordable intermediate (partial ownership).
62 net new homes, 2025
Against a States target of 313/year. The 2016–2025 average is 106/year — about a third of target, and 2025 was the weakest year of the decade.
Purchase price, Q2 2021–Q2 2026
Rental price (£/month), Q2 2021–Q2 2026
“Mix-adjusted average” controls for the changing profile of properties bought/let each quarter, so it tracks the market rather than which properties happened to transact — it is not the price of any individual property. Purchase price includes both realty and personalty (fixtures/fittings). Local Market only (excludes Open Market). States of Guernsey Data & Analysis, "Guernsey Quarterly Residential Property Prices Bulletin, Quarter 2 2026" (issued 11 Aug 2026), Tables 2.1.1 and 8.1.1
States of Guernsey Data & Analysis, Guernsey Annual Residential Property Stock Bulletin 2025 (31 Dec 2025, issued 31 Mar 2026), Tables 2.1.1 and 2.7.1–2.7.5 — gov.gg/property. “Net new homes” is the year’s net change in total domestic property units (new units created, less removals, plus subdivisions/amalgamations) — it is not the same as construction starts. Ownership rate 2021–2025 comes directly from the bulletin’s own tenure-tracking table (2.7.5); 2016–2020 is Bridgehead’s calculation from the same underlying Local and Open Market tenure tables (2.7.2/2.7.3), since the bulletin itself only began tracking ownership trends from 2021. States Strategic Housing Indicator (SSHI) target of 313 units/year: States Strategic Housing Indicator 2023–2027, agreed March 2023 — gov.gg/SSHI-2023-2027. The 2024 monitoring report re-ran the housing needs model and found the target still appropriate (within its ±10% tolerance), despite build rates running well below it.
Visitors
Travel & visitor volumes
Departing passengers by mode, comparing 2024 against 2023 and the last pre-COVID year, 2019 — the two benchmarks the States' own report uses, since 2020–2022 were COVID-distorted.
519,028 departing passengers, 2024
-8% on 2023, -25% on 2019 (pre-COVID). Excludes travel between the Bailiwick’s own islands.
63% by aeroplane
133,651 travelled by ferry (26%), the only mode to grow since 2023. Cruise ship passengers fell 67% against 2019, the steepest drop of any mode.
Departing passengers by mode
- Aeroplane327,603-21% vs 2019
- Ferry133,651-9% vs 2019
- Yacht19,318+16% vs 2019
- Cruise ship38,456-67% vs 2019
COVID-19 travel requirements were in force from Feb 2020, with no non-essential travel allowed 12 Mar-20 May 2020 or 14 Jan-22 Mar 2021, lifted entirely on 17 Feb 2022 - so the report itself compares 2024 against 2019 and 2022, not the intervening years.Yacht passenger counts before Q1 2023 were estimated from vessel numbers rather than counted directly, so the yacht row’s change figures carry more uncertainty than the other three modes. States of Guernsey Data & Analysis, "Guernsey Travel and Visitor Annual Report 2024" (issued 11 Feb 2025), Table 2.1.1
Government
Size of the public sector
Employment share, headcount and cost of the States of Guernsey.
5,154 FTE
States of Guernsey “Core” staffing, 2024 (up from 5,058 in 2023, +1.9% — 70% of the increase was in Health). +374 FTE over the past 5 years, 341 of which in health/social care.
£317.6m pay bill
2024, up from £293m in 2023. States Accounts 2024 also cites a structural annual deficit of roughly £56m.
8.2–8.4% of population
Work in the public sector (~5,300 FTE posts) — smaller than Jersey (~9.5%) or the UK (~8.9%).
18% of the workforce
A different cut — government as a share of jobs, not population — put government at 18% of Guernsey’s workforce against 17% for finance, per the BBC. Not directly comparable to the population-share figure to the left, but the starker of the two.
10% of GDP
“Public administration and defence; compulsory social security and trading bodies” sector GVA: £281m (2018) → £351m (2023).
FTE staffing and pay bill: States Accounts 2024 (published 23 Jun 2025, gov.gg/accounts2024). Workforce-share comparator (18% government vs. 17% finance): cited by the BBC and referenced in Will Walter’s “Make Guernsey Great Again” insight (Dec 2024) — a workforce-share measure, not the population-share measure used elsewhere on this page, so the two numbers are not directly comparable. Public sector share of population and the Jersey/UK comparators: Bailiwick Express, “FACT CHECKED: Is Guernsey’s public sector really ‘small compared to anywhere else’?” (citing published States/Jersey/UK data). Public-sector GVA share of GDP: GVA/GDP Bulletin 2023, Table 3.1.1, gov.gg/gdp.
Net revenue expenditure as a share of GDP
Bridgehead’s own calculation — States of Guernsey “Net Revenue Expenditure” (Segmental Analysis, States Accounts 2013/2016/2018/2020/2022/2023, gov.gg/accounts) divided by nominal GDP for the same year (Table 2.1.1, GVA/GDP Bulletin, above). This is not an officially published ratio — no States of Guernsey source states total spending as a percentage of GDP directly. 2014 is omitted rather than estimated: no comparable figure was sourced for that year. 2020 and 2021 exclude a separately-reported COVID-19 support line (£51.257m and £22.434m); including it takes the ratio to 17.5% and 15.9% respectively. 2024 and 2025 are not shown: that year’s Accounts redesigned this statement to break Alderney and Transferred Services out separately, so the headline figures (£610.0m, £641.6m) aren’t on the same basis as 2013–2023, and no 2024/2025 GDP estimate has been published yet to divide them by. The dashed reference line is the States’ own Fiscal Policy Framework Principle 5 ceiling — “the aggregate amount of States’ revenue should not exceed 24% of GDP” — which is a revenue ceiling, not a spending target, and is shown only for scale, not as a like-for-like comparator.
Cost of living
Incomes, housing costs & the price of food
What an island income actually buys, after housing and at the till. Real median household income fell 10% between 2017 and 2022 while housing took a rising share of what was left.
-10%
Real change in median household income, 2017 to 2022. In cash terms it rose 5.3%, to £55,116.
30.5%
Share of net disposable income going on housing in 2022, up from 24.3% in 2018. Guernsey is the highest bar on the report’s own OECD comparison.
£37,197
Median household income in 2022 after tax, social security and housing costs, equivalised. Lowest quintile £10,284, highest £106,215.
Housing costs as a share of gross income, by tenure
- Affordable renters and partial owners33%
- Lone parents33%
- Private market renters26%(was 22%)
- Owner-occupiers with a mortgage20%
Household Expenditure Survey 2023–24. Three waves exist, so this is a five-yearly step, not a trend.
Annual price change by RPI group, June 2026
- Fuel and light+19%
- Catering (eating out)+6.3%
- All items+4.3%
- Food (shop-bought)+3.2%
Food is its own published RPI group, index 180.5 on a December 2004 = 100 base, meaning shop-bought food has risen 80.5% in 21 years. Next release 27 October 2026.
Savings held, 2023–24
- No savings at all29%
- Less than one month’s income12%
- One to six months24%
- More than six months34%
41% hold less than one month’s income. 11% of households make ends meet with difficulty, rising to 41% among affordable-market renters and partial owners. These questions were new in this wave, so there is no comparator.
Coping with an unexpected expense, 2023
- Could not afford £1005.1%
- Could afford £100, but not easily17.8%
- Could not afford £1,00018.8%
- Could afford £1,000 only with difficulty30.3%
Wellbeing Survey 2023. Guernsey publishes no national-accounts household savings rate at any cadence, so these two panels are the whole picture.
The house price to earnings ratio is frozen. It reads 14.1× at Q3 2024, having peaked at 16× in Q1 2023, and the quarterly bulletin states the table “has not been updated since the third quarter of 2024, since more recent earnings data is not yet available”. The blockage is the suspended earnings bulletin, not the property data, which is current. The ratio that does still move is price to annual rent, at 23.3× in Q2 2026.
States of Guernsey Data & Analysis. Household Income Estimates Report 2022 (incorporating the August 2025 corrigendum, which corrected precisely these real-terms change figures); Household Expenditure Survey 2023–24; Quarterly Inflation Bulletin, June 2026; Residential Property Prices Bulletin; Guernsey & Alderney Wellbeing Survey 2023. The income figures are experimental: 42% of person-level income was machine-learning imputed, and only two comparable points exist. The Annual Household Income Report has no announced next edition.
Also worth watching
Other headline indicators
32,067 employed
June 2024 (28,909 employed + 3,158 self-employed), +0.9% y/y and +6.4% vs June 2020.
RPI 4.3%
Year to June 2026 — gov.gg/rpi.
22.9% of roles
Finance, legal and accounting share of all employment roles, June 2024 (roles, not unique people).
Employment and finance/legal/accounting share of roles: States of Guernsey Quarterly Population, Employment and Earnings Bulletin, issued 29 Oct 2024, gov.gg/population. RPI: States of Guernsey RPI release, year to June 2026 — linked above.
Cost of living
GEL's standing charge rebalancing
How much more islanders now pay just to be connected to the electricity network, regardless of usage - and how that compares with the price cap that protects households in Great Britain but not the Channel Islands.
The quarterly standing charge rose from £68.25 to £86.75in 2025, as GEL’s share of revenue from standing charges (rather than usage) increased from 12.5% to 15%. The revenue-share change is stated in the STSB’s own answer; the pound figures come from Deputy Matthews’ question, which the Board did not restate or dispute. Ofgem’s GB price cap does not apply to the Channel Islands and is shown for scale only. A before/after pair plus one external comparator, not a time series.