Oh David.

"This was all so avoidable, and entirely predictable". .... Are they your prophetic words to pen for Obama in 2013 Q1 when their vast borrowing and simplistic stimulus runs out? We are already seeing it start -- they have waisted their money and their chances. The era of borrow and spend policies is over.

Please dont re-write UK history. The last government borrowed massively -- its not the magic State Fairy why the economy boomed but the sacrafice of the life chances of our kids who are left with the £600Bn debt. They ran down UK industry and grew the state in its place leaving a huge structural deficit. Thats true itsnt it.

All Labour has to offer is winding the clock back to Gordon via toxic Ed Balls. Miliband should reshuffle him out of the shadow chancellor position.

We haven't deserved AAA for some years now.

Of course for the 1% where everything's fine, their masterplan to demolish the social infrastructure allows now alternative. The Tories know EXACTLY what they're doing, ib their crusade against growth.

(You need to deliberately suppress a recovery from recession. The Tories...have)

I posted a comment a year or two ago, stating that no one could save the UK economy; not even Harry Houdini. Alas the UK is still too burdened by debt, high tax and onerous regulation. The Bank of England faked the so called recovery by printing money. In economics speak, it was all nominal; not real.

Maybe Osbourne could have done better at budget time, been more strategic about the UK's long term vision too. However, to say that a monkey could have done a better job, as you just exclaimed on the radio, is nonesense. The UK has a huge debt overhang and will need more time to sober up. Indeed this may involve more debt restructurings/defaults, before GDP advances in a sustainable way.

p.s. Shhhhh.....I won't tell anyone about your lamentable record at the Bank of England with all those other court jesters.

This is so incorrect and I mean that from an "objectve knowledge" assessment and not an "opinion". David's "opinion" is also starkly political and could have been written by Ed Balls.

1. Yes Labour achieved marginally positive GDP growth that has now been lost. But any fool can create GDP growth by bringing forward tomorrow's income and spending it today. Its called taking a sub. But take a week's sub and live on nothing next week. That's why I used the term "fool".

2. Labour provided a mirage turnaround by increasing pensions by 5.5%, benefits by 6%, NMW by 6% and UBR by 7% when inflation was only 2% and an election was comming. Great news for the grey vote and the traditional Labour vote but terrible news for those that work.

Why doesn't Osbourne just resign. In doing so he would remove the single biggest barrier to economic success at a stroke.

I asked government member, Jo Johnson, MP, brother of London Mayor Boris Johnson, if Britain could be a number one economy again. He said no. In fact, as a country he said we are just going to get poorer and poorer relative to other countries. To see the YouTube video of my question and his reply go to:

http://youtu.be/IpvOOqMd6Ww (55 seconds)

All that Blanchflower has argued since the election of the coalition has happened. He appeared to be in a small minority of economists who from the outset argued that Osborne's strategy would lead to a lack of growth - and sadly for Britain, his predictions have proved remarkably accurate. I suspect that the whole Osborne strategy was not really about economics; rather it was an attempt to use the financial crisis as an excuse to create a smaller state. It is argued by some that most of the government cuts have not hit us yet - a scary thought for Britain and for many ordinary people. The sad thing is that I cannot see Osborne and the coalition doing much to change the current situation through a change of policy.

Our part-time chancellor does seem to have a bit of a reverse midas touch, doesn't he? First he masterminds an election campaign which fails to win against one of the most unpopular governments since the war, and then he sinks the economy, and according to the IMF will add £500bn to the national debt by 2015. That's almost as much as Labour added in 13 years...and Labour invested in the economy, not in economic failure.

I wonder what odds I can get on Osborne being moved in the reshuffle?

Bravo to Prof D Blanchflower for scolding G Osborne , and warning him that we may lose our AAA credit rating within a few days if he is stubbornly pursuing a failed economic policy. We are beginning to wonder if incompetent Osborne is familiar with basic economics. God help our over a million young unemployed who will be trapped in a generation of hopelessness and despair if Osborne sticks to his mantra"there is no alternative". When we lose our AAA credit rating , he might be jolted into action.