Report on the economic impact of capital investment plans by Russell Group universities

21 May 2014

Economic research, carried out by BiGGAR Economics, has looked at planned spending by the 24 Russell Group Universities between 2012/13 to 2016/17. It finds that Russell Group universities will spend more than £9 billion on capital projects, a similar amount to that spent on the Olympics or the Government’s current railway investment programme.

Researchers looked at the long term gross value added this investment would produce and calculated that:

• Capital investment by Russell Group universities is expected to generate gross value added (GVA) with a current value of £44.3 billion for the UK economy over the next 25 years.

• This work will support more than 98,500 new UK jobs - including around 37,800 temporary jobs during the five-year construction period, 45,000 permanent operational jobs and almost 15,700 permanent jobs supported by the wider impact of the work undertaken in the new facilities.

• This investment should generate £4.89 for the UK economy for every £1 invested.

The economic impact of capital investment plans by Russell Group Universities

This economic analysis report by BiGGAR Economics finds that spending on buildings and facilities by Russell Group universities will generate billions for the economy and thousands of new jobs across the country in years to come. 

Download (PDF, 1.4MB)

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