YouTube has made its contributions to the U.S. economy clear. In annual Economic Impact Reports, which are conducted by Oxford Economics and published on the official YouTube blog, the Google-owned hub shares its contributions to the job market and national GDP in the United States. In 2024, both of those numbers were massive: YouTube claimed that it added $55 billion to the U.S. GDP while accounting for 490,000 full-time equivalent jobs.
As big as those numbers are, they don’t tell the whole story. YouTube has continued to accelerate overseas, with innovations like YouTube Shorts powering significant viewership upticks in countries like Spain.
To calculate its influence beyond its home country, YouTube has expanded its Economic Impact Report to the European Union. A new Oxford Economics survey found that YouTube’s creators contributed €7 billion to the European GDP in 2024, with the platform supporting more than 200,000 jobs across the continent.
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“There are more ways for creators and businesses to make money on YouTube than ever, and we’re seeing them reinvest this money in their content, teams, and operations,” YouTube CEO Neal Mohan said in the preamble to the report. “Looking at this momentum and toward the next two decades, the creator economy is just getting started.”
YouTube’s engagement with its European community has ramped up this year. In July, the platform revealed the results of a creator survey in the United Kingdom; minimal training options and insufficient recognition from traditional power players emerged as common frustrations. Two months later, YouTube announced the launch of a U.K. advocacy group. At the time, Oxford Economics data showed that YouTube had added £2.2 billion to the U.K. economy in 2024 while supporting the equivalent of more than 45,000 full-time jobs.
Those gains aren’t just happening in the U.K. — they are being seen across multiple European nations. The latest report notes that the number of channels earning at least €10,000 in revenue is up 15% year-over-year. To echo British creator sentiments regarding a perceived lack of recognition, 64% of E.U. creators said that YouTube provides opportunities to create and earn that are not available through traditional channels.
The ramifications of that global expansion are being felt in fields like politics and health. 52% of YouTube users have searched for news on the platform, with 78% judging that the sources they find through YouTube are credible. The survey respondents praised YouTube’s mental health resources as well. Of the 31% of respondents who look up mental health information on YouTube, 74% described that info as “authoritative.”
At the end of the day, however, YouTube’s European effort is just a drop in the bucket compared to the $100 billion the platform reportedly paid out to creators, artists, and media companies globally between January 2021 and December 2024. The E.U. still has room for further growth, but the current data regarding news and mental health could be helpful for YouTube as the platform looks to keep regulators off its back.
