The elephant in the room

We are all aware that the deficit this year is projected to increase by around £167 billion, but we are then told that it is due to decline over the next few years as the economy recovers and as the proposed increases in National Insurance kick in. Indeed the Treasury currently projects that the deficit will "only" be £74 billion by the fiscal year 2014/15, so everything is fine - well no, absolutely not! Recently I have noticed that figures such as £167 billion just trip off the tongue of newscasters and are easily shown on the pages of newspapers so I thought it might be interesting to...