A group of university economists issued an open letter on Monday praising the Labor-led federal government for its outstanding handling of the Australian economy during the height of the global financial crisis, which they said saved the country from sliding into the pit of recession.

The loosely assembled body of 51 professors and lecturers from the country's top universities lauded the commonwealth's stimulus programs when the financial downturn hit the world economy, which also resulted to a stall in rising unemployment.

Leading the group was Emeritus Professor Raja Junankar of the University of Western Sydney, who added that 15 more signatories from the law profession, social policy, economic and union advisers joined the manifesto of support for Labor's economic policies, bringing the total number of signatures to 66.

The economists and academicians declared in their letter that as evidence had shown, they were convinced that "the coordinated policies of the Australian Labor government have prevented the Australian economy from a deep recession and prevented a massive increase in unemployment."

The group lauded the government's decision to provide cash handouts to the country's taxpayers in order to push for continued confidence on the retail sector as it added that the succeeding first home owners grant and the Building the Education Revolution schemes had resulted to sustained construction activities, which in turn generated new jobs.

The letter came out following Nobel-laureate Joseph Stiglitz' earlier endorsement of Labor's remarkable economic policies during the global financial crisis, which was effectively re-echoed into the group's belief that "the performance of the Australian economy has been outstanding."

It also provided a much-needed boost to Labor's bid to retain government control as the opposition scored Prime Minister Julia Gillard's economic management of the nation as 'laughable', though opposition leader Tony Abbot consistently declined any offer of economic debates from Labor party leaders.

Ms Gillard has anchored the party's re-election bid on the strength of Labor's sterling records in handling Australia' economy, which she stressed, had positively deflected the ill effects of the worldwide financial downturn.