These should then be offset with surpluses during upswings.
For the past three decades, UK trade has been the story of a growing deficit in manufactured trade offset by surpluses in oil, services and investment income.
An alternative would be for competitive, trade-surplus countries, such as Germany and the Netherlands, to spend more: the combined deficits of the euro zone's "periphery" are more or less offset by surpluses at the zone's "core" (see chart 4).
But most Keynesians, anxious to appear fiscally responsible, say that budget deficits in bad times should be offset by surpluses in good times, keeping the level of debt seemly.
But the net deficit in 2005-06 hid a much bigger gross shortfall of £1.3 billion among a third of the 600 NHS organisations in 2005-06, wasch was partially offset by surpluses in the rest of the health service.
This means that the natural tendency for the government to run current-budget deficits when the economy is weak must be offset by surpluses when the economy is strong.The Treasury judges that the current economic cycle started in 1999-2000 and will end in 2005-06.
Also, in the slow movements spasms of dissonance are used to offset the surplus of beauty; Scott Burnham notes that the famous Andante of the Concerto No. 21 contains a quietly shuddering five-note collection that is not so much a chord as a cluster.
After years of trade deficits, Brazil recorded a $13.2 billion surplus last year, offsetting a slide in foreign direct investment, which had financed past deficits.
The treasurer, Scott Morrison, and the finance minister, Mathias Cormann, were at pains to say when releasing the Myefo in Perth that they had worked hard to keep the budget on track for a surplus through offsetting new expenditure with savings.
