As an Australian citizen, I would like to wish Mathias Cormann all the best at the OECD. I can only hope and pray that Mr Cormann does to the OECD what he did to the WA Liberal Party.

But what exactly is the OECD, I hear you say?

The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) is an international organisation that works to build better policies for better lives. Our goal is to shape policies that foster prosperity, equality, opportunity and well-being for all. We draw on 60 years of experience and insights to better prepare the world of tomorrow.

Goal, please note. How do things work out when we look at goals and actual results, the classic government paradox?

Recently, economists at the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) published a retrospective study of its economic forecasts. This qualifies as an act of bureaucratic courage, because the record was predictably dismal. Not only did the OECD miss the 2008/09 financial crisis, but it routinely over-predicted the recovery’s strength. In May 2010, for example, the OECD forecast that the US economy would grow 3.2 per cent in 2011. Actual growth was 1.7 per cent. This is a huge error, and there were larger misses for some European economie as well.

A predictably dismal record.

So strange that a mob of politicians, bureaucrats and technocrats cannot successfully centrally plan the world economy.

Stephen Spartacus writes at Sparty’s Cast, where an earlier version of this piece also appears.