EU is second-biggest contributor to global GDP

The European Union generated 18.6 percent of the world Gross Domestic Product in 2018, according to the most recent data published by Eurostat. The contribution is the second-largest share after the United States (24.0%) and ahead of China (15.2%) and Japan (5.8%).

The EU’s size in the world GDP, however, slid seven percentage points over a decade from 2008 when it topped 25 percent. China and India, on the other hand, have grown considerably over the same period with the former rising from 7.2 percent to 15.9 percent, and the latter from 2.0 percent to 3.2 percent.

In 2018, the United Kingdom represented 3.3 percent of the global GDP, the fifth-largest contributor. The G20 countries, which include the EU as an entity as well as three individual EU members (Germany, France, and Italy), were jointly responsible for 86 percent of the world GDP.

Services accounted to over half of the total gross value added in all G20 countries except for Saudi Arabia and Indonesia. The EU registered the fourth-largest portion of total gross value added in its economy, with a share just shy of 73 percent. Services in the UK and the US both stood at 80.0 percent while they made up 73.0 percent of Brazil’s economy.