The US will continue to run a budget deficit of in excess of 10pc of GDP for at least another year. This is in marked contrast to most other advanced economies, where the fiscal axe is now being swung, with consolidation now beginning in earnest. The danger is that the bond markets won’t care – and almost all Western sovereign instruments will become burdened with a big risk premium, even the bonds of those countries which have actually bitten the bullet and started to impose serious fiscal reforms. If ministers in Britain and Germany would like to know in advance what this feels like and the domestic political havoc it can cause, they should talk to their Irish counterparts.