Abuja, the massive, unfinished folly of a capital that Nigeria began building in 1981, has failed to boost the country's under-inhabited interior.
Iain Duncan Smith, elected leader in the wake of that defeat, has failed to boost the party's poll ratings or heal its divisions.
So far, efforts to increase the UK's skills base and encourage businesses to invest in the latest processes and equipment has failed to boost productivity.
A relaunch has failed to boost listeners and a new policy of cutting its ads has hit the group's bottom line.
But the debt-financed consumer boom has failed to boost manufacturing output, which has barely shown any increase over the past eight years.
There is some truth in this, but another reason why the policy has failed to boost spending is that overindebted households and firms prefer to save and repay debt.
Coal is dug up by a state-monopolist that has failed to boost output significantly in recent years, unlike China (see chart 1), and so cannot keep up with demand.
Although rural couples whose first child is a girl, and parents who are only children themselves have been allowed to have a second child for roughly a year, it has failed to boost population growth.
