However, Gen Mohammed al-Assar, a member of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (Scaf), told the Reuters news agency the decision had been "based on consultation with the field marshal, and the rest of the military council".

BBC: Egypt President Mursi explains army chief replacement

Mr Snower complains that most of his colleagues' thinking about the economy has been conditioned by the Industrial Revolution, and that he and Assar Lindbeck, the Swedish economist with whom he has been studying this change, have had to come up with a new set of analytical tools to examine it.

ECONOMIST: Why pay is becoming less equal