Recent Release | 18 Oct 2022
The impact of YouTube in the UK
Economic Consulting Team
Oxford Economics
This study assesses YouTube’s contribution to GDP and employment in the United Kingdom, and its broader impact on society and culture.
YouTube enables content creators from the UK to reach both domestic and global audiences. Since creators are paid a share of revenues from adverts placed alongside their videos, access to these audiences can enable them to earn substantial incomes from their content. A successful YouTube channel can also help creators earn income from other sources, including product sales, brand partnerships, and live performances.
Successful channels not only provide jobs and income for creators, but also support further jobs and income in the supply chains behind the content and through workers’ spending. In total, our economic modelling suggests that YouTube’s creative ecosystem contributed more than £1.4 billion to the UK’s GDP and supported more than 40,000 full-time equivalent jobs in 2021.
In this report, we outline our economic analysis, as well as the findings of wider survey research investigating how YouTube can sustain careers for content creators; help businesses grow; deliver cultural and societal impacts; and build skills and knowledge amongst users.
Alongside the findings from our economic modelling and surveys, we present a series of case studies to highlight the personal stories of successful content creators in the UK.
About the team
Our economic consulting team are world leaders in quantitative economic analysis, working with clients around the globe and across sectors to build models, forecast markets and evaluate interventions using state-of-the art techniques. Lead consultants on this project included:
Andrew P Goodwin
Director of Applied Economics, Europe & Middle East
+44 (0) 203 910 8050
Andrew P Goodwin
Director of Applied Economics, Europe & Middle East
London, United Kingdom
Andrew is Director of Applied Economics, Europe & Middle East, and is based in our London office.
Since joining Oxford Economics in 2013 Andrew has led studies across a range of subject areas for public and private sector clients. These include projects for the Global Infrastructure Hub and PwC to forecast global infrastructure needs; economic impact studies in the aviation, maritime and defence sectors; work for cultural institutions such as the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and the British Library; analysing the impact of R&D support for clients including BEIS and the Centre for Process Innovation; and labour market studies for the UK Commission for Employment and Skills, the Department for Transport, and the Northern Ireland Department for Employment and Learning.
Before joining Oxford Economics, Andrew spent six years working as a Government economist at the Home Office and Department for Transport. Prior to that Andrew worked at DTZ Research and Consulting, where his responsibilities included analysing local economies and economic forecasting. Andrew holds an MSc in European Economic Integration from the University of Kent, where his dissertation analysed drivers of growth for European cities, and a BA in Economics with European Study from the University of Exeter.
Margarida Secca Serra
Economist, Economic Impact
+44 (0) 20 3910 8152
Margarida Secca Serra
Economist, Economic Impact
London, United Kingdom
Margarida joined Oxford Economics in 2019 as a graduate in the London office.
She works in the Applied Economics team where she has been involved in a variety of projects, including a literature review on the effectiveness of soft drink taxation on health and revenue objectives, and a literature review on the benefits of digital services in Europe. She has also supported the econometric modelling of future demand for meat in the UK and several reports on the economic, societal, and cultural benefits of YouTube in different countries.
Before joining Oxford Economics, Margarida worked for the Portuguese Agency for Trade and Investment in London. She holds both a BSc and a MSc in Economics from NOVA SBE and while completing her dissertation, she did an internship at the Portuguese Ministry of Economy.
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