In spite of the November Budget, output has risen quite strongly since the autumn. The economy is now working at about full capacity—in the sense that unemployment is now as low as it was at the lowest point of the previous cycle (in the spring of 1961).
In our view, the April Budget, together with the credit restrictions, will slow down the rise in output from now on, but will not by any means bring it to a halt. Our forecast of the movement of real domestic product shows it as rising at an annual rate of around 2½ per cent a year from the first quarter of 1965 to the second quarter of 1966 (table 1).