Global Entrepreneurship Monitor: UK Report 2022/23

The Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) research consortium measured rates of entrepreneurship across multiple phases in 49 economies in 2022, making it the world’s most authoritative comparative study of entrepreneurial activity in the general adult population. In the UK in 2022, 10,173 adults aged 18 to 80 participated in the GEM survey. This monitoring report for the UK compares GEM measures of entrepreneurial attitudes, activity and aspirations in the UK, France, Germany and the United States. It also compares the results across the four home nations of the UK. The results from the GEM UK Adult Population Survey (APS) and National Expert Survey (NES) for 2022 provide a unique opportunity to lift the lid on a range of issues which lie at the heart of the entrepreneurial process in the midst of the crisis. Once again 2022 provided a volatile backdrop against which to undertake the GEM APS in the UK with geo-political events creating economic uncertainty manifested in a cost of living crisis, record high inflation and falling output in an already stagnating economy. This was made worse in Q3 by home-grown political turmoil throughout the summer months as the UK’s Prime Minister was forced to resign. The result was a collapse of business confidence in an already fragile economy trying to recover from the effects of the pandemic and the UK’s exit from the EU. A perfect storm indeed in which to undertake the GEM survey.