And yet he and Mr Blair appointed a tax avoider to his Treasury team.

ECONOMIST: Labour��s stumbles

But it was not the most aggressive avoider of taxes.

ECONOMIST: Buttonwood

Mr Obama has let one former tax-avoider through: Tim Geithner, the new treasury secretary, who failed to pay self-employment taxes when he was a consultant for the International Monetary Fund. (Foes of America's absurdly complicated tax code were delighted to note that even a reputedly brilliant economic mind failed to comply with it.) But with the financial and economic crisis raging, Mr Geithner appeared simply too important to lose.

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