economists alberto alesina, carlo a. favero and francesco giavazzi, writing in "finance & development" in 2018, argued that deficit reduction policies based on spending cuts typically have almost no effect on output, and hence form a better route to achieving a reduction in the debt-to-gdp ratio than raising taxes. the authors commented that the uk government austerity programme had resulted in growth that was higher than the european average and that the uk's economic performance had been much stronger than the international monetary fund had predicted.