Jovial, poking fun at Wayne Swan, engaging in mock indignation at budget blow-outs and revenue shortfalls, highlighting a mining tax that raised no revenue. It was all great fun. Another dig was that a Labor government would never achieve a budget surplus. It was not in their DNA.

Two years ago, just before Christmas, Swan admitted that his government would not be achieving its target of a budget surplus. It was a humiliating blow to Labor's record as economic manager, though the avowed objective was imposed on it not by the financial markets but the Labor Party itself. Most economists felt it was too onerous a task to drive the budget back into surplus so soon after the pump-priming to stave off the global financial crisis. Now it looks like Hockey's reign as treasurer is also going to be marked down as a big disappointment.

He has to eat humble pie and has admitted to a mistake in selling this year's budget. Admitting to a mistake burns up a lot of political capital. When shadow treasurer he would proclaim that making such a mistake should result in resignation. It's different now he is Treasurer. To compound it, Hockey's countenance appears currently on two business magazines - one for company directors, the other for chartered accountants. Ouch. At airport bookshops his ill-timed biography is still on display.

Has there been a time when major parts of a Commonwealth budget are still in gridlock seven months after budget night? In fact, Hockey has made the record books there. When in opposition he made great play of Labor's "deficit and debt disaster", but he never admitted it was a result of resource prices falling and less tax revenue flowing in from the corporate sector. Now he is lumbered with the same problem but it's much more dramatic.

The Australian terms of trade have fallen from the dizzy heights only a few years ago. Now Hockey has moved even further, saying that, for the medium term, a surplus is unthinkable. Maybe 2021 if we are lucky. Coping with the economy is now the budget's primary focus. This quick two-step will puzzle the electorate, because Joe always said he would get Australia back into budgetary surplus come what may. That's partly why the Coalition won last year.

How will Hockey be perceived in the history books? One person who might know is shadow treasurer Chris Bowen. He is writing a book on Australia's most significant treasurers. It's unlikely Joe will make the cut, unlike Peter Costello or Artie Fadden, who were the first and the third longest- reigning treasurers in Australia's history.

Were Bowen to approach the book using, say, doubles or complements, perhaps he might link Hockey and Swan together, because they both became unstuck with silly promises to balance the budget. It is little wonder Reserve Bank governor Glenn Stevens has called for Australian politicians to get real about Australia's medium-term fiscal crisis.

Swan had the luxury of soaring terms of trade, while Hockey has to cope with the largest collapse since Paul Keating was Treasurer in 1986. Let's remember that Swan did manage to steer the Australian economy through the global financial crisis, when most of our trading partners, bar China, fell into recession.

Hockey could pull his reputation from the flames by plotting a path for Australia through its income depression and falling terms of trade. If he could be at helm when Australia notches up 25 years of continuous growth in 2016 it would be some landmark. It would also be some achievement, with diffident consumption spending and the investment resources boom well over.

One thing in his favour is that a lower dollar will act as the shock absorber by giving our export industries a boost. This external boost might offset the fierce cutback in public spending.

Hockey has already said he would not pursue more public sector cutbacks when economic conditions are soft, yet the measures announced in his mid-year economic review suggest otherwise.

Alex Millmow teaches economics at Federation University, Australia.