For a long time, the UK has marginalized its past as a financier, trader and owner of slaves, and has downplayed the economic significance that slavery had for the country. However, research shows that the income from slavery was huge and that it still affects the British economy today.
Klas Rönnbäck, researcher in Economic History at the University of Gothenburg, has studied the economic consequences of slavery and has estimated that the scale of activities linked to the slavery complex in America during the 18th century reached a peak corresponding to 10 percent of the British GDP. Some of this capital is today in banks and companies whose predecessors profited from slavery.
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