Gross domestic product grew by 1% in 2019

Finland's economy grew in 2019.

According to Statistics Finland’s preliminary data, the volume of Finnish gross domestic product (GDP) increased by 1% last year. The growth for 2018 was revised to 1.6 per cent and its industry-specific data were now published at a detailed industry level.

Source: Statistics Finland.

Supply

The current price value of value added grew by 3.1% in 2019 and totalled 208 billion euros. The value of taxes on products was 33 billion euros and the value of product subsidies was one billion euros. The value of GDP calculated from these items was 240 billion euros.

The value of imports increased by 2.5% to 95 billion euros. The volume of imports went up by 2.2%.

Demand

The value of exports grew by 6.4% to 96 billion euros in 2019. The volume of exports grew by 7.2% as the prices of export products went down by 0.7%.

Goods exports rose due to orders of ships delivered abroad in 2019, for example. For other demand items the delivery of ships abroad was visible as a reduction in inventories.

The value of the biggest demand item, private consumption expenditure, increased by 2% to 126 billion euros. The value of government consumption expenditure grew by 3.9% to 55 billion euros.

The current price value of investments increased by 1.8% to 57 billion euros. The volume of investments fell by 0.8%.

Households’ savings ratio turned positive

Households’ adjusted disposable income grew in real terms, that is, adjusted for price changes by 1.8% in 2019.

Adjusted disposable income also includes social transfers in kind, which can be interpreted as welfare services offered to households. These services are the individual educational, health and social services that general government and organisations produce for households.

Households’ final consumption expenditure increased by 1.9% and households’ savings amounted to good 0.7 billion euros (-0.5 billion euros in 2018). The savings ratio was 0.6%.

Wages and salaries and employment

The growth rate of the wages and salaries sum of the whole economy and employed persons slowed down in 2019.

Last year, the wages and salaries sum of the whole economy grew by 3.1% compared to the previous year (4.6% in 2018). In turn, the number of employed persons increased by 0.9% from the year before (2.5% in 2018).

The number of hours worked by employed persons went up by 0.8% from the previous year (2.3% in 2018). According to preliminary data, social security contributions paid by employers went down by 1.4% from the year before. The fall is due to lower statutory employers’ social contribution percentages than in the previous year.

Government deficit increased

The financial position, or net lending, of general government showed a deficit of 2.7 billion euros. In the previous year, the deficit was 2 billion euros.

The deficit was 1.1% relative to GDP.

The deficit of central government was 2.8 billion euros, while one year before it was 2.9 billion euros. In turn, the deficit of local government (municipalities and joint municipal authorities...) grew to 2.9 billion euros.

The growth in local government deficit was caused by an increase in government consumption expenditure and investments.