Is the UK once again the economic sick man? Or is it, as Alistair Darling, chancellor of the exchequer, argued in his Budget speech on Wednesday, just one of a number of hard-hit high-income countries? The answers to these questions are: yes and yes. The explanation for this ambiguity is that the fiscal deterioration is extraordinary, but the economic collapse is not.

Let us start with the economy. According to the International Monetary Fund's latest World Economic Outlook, the UK economy will contract by 4.1 per cent this year, followed by a further contraction of 0.4 per cent next year. This, it should be stressed, is far worse than the 3.5 per cent contraction in 2009 and 1.25 per cent expansion in 2010 forecast by the Treasury.

The IMF puts forward the following forecasts for other big economies: -3.8 per cent in 2009 and 0.0 in 2010 for all advanced countries; -2.8 per cent and 0.0 for the US; -4.2 per cent and -0.4 per cent for the eurozone; -5.6 per cent and -1.0 per cent for Germany; and -6.2 per cent and 0.5 per cent for Japan. Thus, the UK's forecast performance is close to the mean for all advanced countries and better than for Germany and Japan.