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adding that the richest 85 people in the world own the same amount of wealth as the bottom half of the world's population.

"It leads to an economy of exclusion, and a wasteland of discarded potential," Lagarde said.

Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the IMF's managing director, warned that "we face the risk of a lost generation", adding: "When you lose your job, your health is likely to be worse. When you lose your job, the education of your children is likely to be worse. When you lose your job, social stability is likely to be worse – which threatens democracy and even peace. So we shouldn't fool ourselves. We are not out of the woods yet. And for the man in the street, a recovery without jobs doesn't mean much."

Tim Geithner, Obama's treasury secretary, said: "The United States believes that global rebalancing is not progressing as well as needed to avoid threats to the global economic recovery.

"The last decade could be characterised by the three words 'made in China'. In this next decade, it will be 'owned by China'."

In the first half of 2010, the story was that the big emerging economies – India, China and Brazil – were acting as the locomotive for global growth. But during the second half of 2010, there were signs of the United States and Germany joining the party