NORMALLY deep recessions are followed by more rapid recoveries. But the world has been remarkably slow in rebounding from the financial crisis. Credit Suisse just published a note showing the extent to which real GDP in various countries was above or below its level in the fourth quarter of 2007, back when bankers at Bear Stearns and Lehman were still looking forward to their bonuses.

                                  Change in GDP(%)

 US                                +6.5
Germany                      +4.0
France                          +0.5
Japan                           +0.4
Britain                          -1.2
Euro area                     -2.1
Spain                           -6.6
Ireland                         -8.0
Italy                             -8.5
Greece                        -23.5
By contrast, the Chinese economy is 66% bigger than it was at the end of 2007 and India is 45% larger. Power is shifting east.

 But back to the developed world. Doubtless, economists will spend the next 20 years debating why the recovery has been so varied. Was it monetary policy? Rates have been cut to nearly zero and balance sheets have been expanded on both sides of the Atlantic. The Fed has been more aggressive than the ECB but the German growth record does not look that bad compared with the US. Of course, the big problem has been in the bond markets where there was such a huge rise in peripheral yields that the effect was to tighten policy. 

 Still, that explanation doesn't account for the differential between German, French and British growth.

 So what about fiscal policy? Purists like to look at cyclically-adjusted deficits but that does leave room for judgment as to the length of the cycle. The next table shows the level of government revenues and expenditure as a proportion of GDP in both 2007 and 2013, and the net movement in the balance (figures from the IMF's World Economic Outlook)
                                                        2007                   2013    Balance change
                                         Rev     Exp          Rev     Exp
US                                     33.9    36.7         33.2    40.5        -4.5
Germany                          43.7    43.5         44.4    44.8        -0.6
France                              49.9    52.6         52.6    56.1       -0.8
Japan                                31.2    33.3         31.5    40.6       -7.0
Britain                              37.3    40.2         37.1    44.4       -4.4
Spain                                 41.1    39.2         36.4    42.1       -7.6
Ireland                              36.5    36.4         34.5    42.1       -7.7
Italy                                  46.0    47.6          48.8    50.6       -0.2
Greece                              40.8    47.6          44.9    49.6       +2.1
Distinguishing cause and effect is pretty difficult here, of course; Greece has been forced into tighter policy. A big economic downturn tends to collapse tax revenues and widen deficits, whether or not governments plan this to happen in the Keynesian sense. But there doesn't seem much of a difference between US and UK policy on these numbers, and yet the US has done a lot better. Germany and France have hardly hit the fiscal accelerator but both have done better than Britain and a lot better than Italy, although its fiscal policy has followed similar lines.

 So maybe, just maybe, these differences are down to the fundamental strength of the economies; the US is just more dynamic and Germany is more competitive than its neighbours, while Britain and Ireland had economnies that were too dependent on housing and finance.