Economic policymakers typically argue that the US current account deficit, the fact that the nation imports more than it exports, is sustainable because it has a large internal market.

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Even more worrying, in the short term, is that alarming statistic I flagged up last week: the Office for Budget Responsibility expects us to run a current account deficit of 4% of GDP in 2012.

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That is in contrast with the US, with its large current account deficit and its borrowing from China.

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The primary cause for this difference in debt-holding is that the US has been running a current account deficit for years, while Japan has historically always exported more than it imports.

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