We summarize the history of macroeconometric system modelling as having produced four generations of models. Over time the principles underlying the model designs have been extended to incorporate eight major features. Because models often evolve in response to external events we are led to ask what has happened to models used in the policy process since the financial crisis on 2008/9. We find that models have become smaller but that there is still no standard way of capturing the effects of such a crisis.