As Robert Neild knew, politicians don’t want wise advice

The state of the UK balance of payments recalls the crisis of 1964-67 - but the threat of a no-deal Brexit makes it far worse

One of the great economist John Maynard Keynes's most memorable statements was: "In the long run we are all dead."

Alas, Keynes himself did not have an especially long run. Those wearing negotiations he undertook with the Americans and others on the postwar international economic settlement took their toll, as vividly described in Robert Skidelsky's masterly biography. He most certainly battled for his country, as well as for a less depression-prone or beggar-my-neighbour world economy than was experienced in the 1920s and 1930s.

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