0 an occasion when a person or vehicle comes down from the air to the ground without difficulty or damage --
1 a period when economic growth slows down, but the economy does not enter recession: --
There is no such thing as a soft landing or a shallow recession except in the imagination of politicians, particularly those in office.
People who hold that view say that, as a result, the economy will have a hard landing rather than the soft landing that everyone anticipates.
Many of us, of course, conclude that the zone of stability is the euro zone, after we have negotiated a soft landing.
We talk here of a soft landing, which for me means pulling the wool over the milk producers' eyes.
Yesterday's gross domestic product figures for the past quarter showed that we have achieved our soft landing.
It may also be some time before that soft landing occurs.
I welcome the fact that we hope to secure a soft landing across the economy.
So far, that has worked successfully to produce not the recession that people feared six months ago, but, hopefully, a soft landing.