Fewer UK workers go the extra mile. Is productivity still up on a year ago?

What happened

Britons have become less engaged with their jobs over the last decade, a Resolution Foundation report found, and this could partly explain slow productivity growth since the pandemic.

Fewer UK workers say they would work harder than their job asks. The share fell from 69% in 2015 to 55% in 2025, a Resolution Foundation report found on 3 November, using the British Social Attitudes survey of 4,656 adults. Job satisfaction fell from 81% in 2015 to 74% in 2025, the lowest since the question was first asked in 1989.

The think tank said this change “may have contributed to weak productivity growth”, which slowed after the financial crisis and again after the pandemic. Productivity here means how much the economy produces for each hour people work. Hannah Slaughter, principal economist at the Resolution Foundation, said the drop “doesn’t bode well for productivity and labour supply”.

The next official figure comes on 17 November from the Office for National Statistics (ONS). In August its two measures for April to June pointed different ways. Using payroll data from the tax system, output per hour was 0.7% higher than a year earlier. Using a household survey, it was 0.2% lower. The ONS said the payroll measure was the best one for now.

Productivity flash estimate and overview, UK: July to September 2026 and April to June 2026. Release date: 17 November 2026 9:30am

ONS release calendar

This release is also due to be the first with a new ONS way of counting hours worked. In September the ONS wrote that it “will be implemented for the whole economy in our November 2026 quarterly Productivity flash estimate” and will replace the current figures. Under the new way, output per hour grew 1.3% a year from 2009 to 2019, against 0.7% under the old one.

Sources: BBC, The Guardian, ONS (2)

The Pattern

We looked for cases where the ONS published its quick estimate of output per hour after the quarter before had shown a fall over the quarter and slower yearly growth, in the years after the financial crisis and the pandemic. We found five such quick estimates, from 2022 to 2026, out of 42 published for quarters since late 2015. In four of them output per hour was higher than a year earlier, and in August 2022 it was 1.0% lower, because hours worked grew faster than output.

The Read

Recent figures point to growth. The ONS said on 15 October that the economy was 1.8% bigger in the three months to August than a year earlier, the fastest yearly growth since 2022, while the number of people on payrolls was 0.3% lower than a year before. For output per hour to fall below a year earlier, hours worked would have to grow about as fast as output. In April to June they grew 0.4% on the payroll measure and 1.4% on the survey. The new way of counting also shows hours growing more slowly than the old survey count.

There are reasons for doubt. All five quick estimates came from the same office and used the survey count of hours, and the 17 November figure is due to be the first on the new method, which also rewrites the past figures. In all five the quarter before was below a year earlier, while in August the payroll measure showed growth of 0.7%. The two quick estimates closest to today, in February and August 2026, both showed yearly growth slowing. Across all 33 quick estimates since mid-2018, output per hour was below a year earlier 19 times. The ONS also calls the effects of its new method “indicative and intended for user engagement”, so a delay is possible.

Sources: ONS (2, 3, 4, 5)