“Reagan proved that deficits don’t matter,” US vice-president Dick Cheney told Paul O’Neill in 2002, when the Treasury Secretary expressed doubts about a round of tax cuts. Donald Trump appears set to test whether the proof still holds — if it ever did.

His victory has already prompted nostalgic references to Ronald Reagan — whose election in 1980 was greeted with similar scepticism. The comparison is flawed by big changes in the US and global economies in the intervening 36 years. But if there is one area where Mr Trump’s approach most resembles that of his predecessor, it is fiscal plans likely to lead to a huge rise in the US deficit.

Mr Trump’s comments on the campaign trail simply do not translate into a coherent economic plan. His angry rhetoric on trade and hostility to the Fed’s stimulus policies are consistent with a wide range of policies, some alarming and some much less so.