There has been a bit of fun in the last week, with the IMF accusing our previous conservative government (10 increasing surpluses out of 11 years in power – 1996-2007) of being the only period of profligate fiscal policy over the last 50 years. That is hysterical really because the government in question held themselves out as the exemplars of fiscal prudence and responsibility. They were, in fact, one of the most irresponsible managers of macroeconomic policy in our history, but not for the reasons that the IMF would identify. All this shows how far fetched the research that the IMF is spending millions of public dollars (donated by member governments) has become. One week they are admitting how wrong their forecasts are with millions losing their jobs as a result and the next week they are handing out medals for fiscal prudence and backhanders for wasteful spending. I was going to analyse the underlying IMF paper today because it is illustrative of why the IMF keeps making these fundamental errors. But I was sidetracked and got lost in some data and some other things. So the IMF tomorrow (maybe) and today a little walk through some trends which confirm why the IMF has a problem recruiting good economists. It all starts with their miseducation in our universities. The point is a casual look at the data shows that the mainstream of my profession hasn’t been even remotely correct in its statements over the last 4-5 years.