cgt,do you have bands(ranges of accuracy)ie,low level accuracy,mid level,high level. Or maybe a tone of pessimism,through to optimism?
Would there be a "mirror report" with an alternative option?
Of course the easiest option is to aim low and overshoot,conversely as you put it,over promise and under deliver. Im not trying to politicise this,was this Costello's way,ie aim low and over deliver?
Peter Costello has never tired of pointing to the "budget black hole" presided over by the Keating government as evidence of Labor's profligacy. Yet the deficits of the early '90s were not the result of bad management, but rather of an appropriate economic policy in the aftermath of a recession. In a recession, the budget will automatically go into deficit because tax intakes fall (as profits go down) and government outlays go up (unemployment benefits, for example). Should the government slash unemployment benefits and other government programs for the sake of the budget balance? Most economists would say no, because reducing the deficit would compound the recession by further reducing demand in the economy. Far from being irresponsible, deficit spending in a recession is widely accepted to be sound economic policy.
