Global Economy

Like many economic events, the key lies not in what is immediately apparent — explosively large banks — but in those causes and conditions that are veiled. Politicians, pundits, and the population of the Icelandic nation have had a difficult time explaining how such a large financial sector could develop in the first place.

Government planners developed a particular aesthetic obsession: they were frustrated by the untidy complexity of real human societies.

Gold is the universal language and has been for eons.

Irish dirt is an actual product that people can and do buy.

In fact, it is pretty clear that there is no such thing as homemade ice cream, and that we use the phrase only in the most metaphorical sense. Thank goodness. The store is just the last stop in a huge and extended process that emerged over centuries and requires the involvement of people all over the world.

The world had never seen government paper money until the colonial government of Massachusetts, 1690.

Try to find someone in present-day Vienna who is familiar with the exceptional work of the former finance minister of the Austrian monarchy.

It was a modern thriving economy one day, and then, suddenly, the food disappeared from the shelves, the banks closed, and the ships stopped arriving. Iceland in 2008 experienced an unprecedented economic meltdown that struck fear in the hearts...

In a wider historical perspective, the current currency war is the latest conflict in a series of acute crises of the modern international monetary system. In a world of national monetary regimes based on fiat money without physical anchors, domestic monetary instability automatically transforms into exchange-rate instability.

This world-renowned merchant seeks no fame for his business achievements.