Bubble and squeak: Akya
Monday’s “final deadline” for Greece to resolve its debt negotiations with the “group formerly known as the Troika” (i.e. the EU, ECB and the IMF) came and went with a few noises about “constructive discussions” and a further announcement of a “final deadline” 48 hours hence i.e. sometime on Wednesday (24th June) based on my (t)rusty desktop calendar. The first thing you do after reading a sentence like that is wonder why on earth any author would need to nest so many phrases within double quotation marks; the second thing you start wondering is how any particular situation can have so many final deadlines; and lastly you wonder why anyone still uses a desktop calendar. At least the last bit is easily explained, which is that I am a grumpy old man.
A wise man once told me that the Phoenicians invented money, only for the Greeks to immediately conjure up its disappearance. Jokes aside though, for the past 2000 years or so the Greeks have been merrily jumping from one crisis to the next, defaulting to one creditor and then the next. This whole idea of not repaying one’s debts almost seems like a national pastime around there, from what we can gather looking at a few history books.
To recap, the current crisis emanates from 2009 when the first default by the Greek sovereign was mooted over the country’s inability to secure refinancing for its maturing debts. Since most of its maturing debts were in the form of sovereign bonds held by wealthy European savers (these people are popularly referred to as “Germans”), other willing parties needed to buy the bonds off pesky creditors and agree for restructuring efforts.
http://atimes.com/2015/06/bubble-and-squeak-akya/
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Chanakya (About this sound pronunciation (help·info); 350 – 275 BCE)[1][2]was an Indian teacher, philosopher, economist, jurist and royal advisor. He is traditionally identified as Kautilya or Vishnu Gupta, who authored the ancient Indian political treatise, the Arthaśāstra (Economics).[3] As such, he is considered as the pioneer of the field of political science and economics in India, and his work is thought of as an important precursor to classical economics.[4][5][6][7] His works were lost near the end of the Gupta Empire and not rediscovered until 1915.[5]
Originally a professor of economics and political science at the ancient university of Taxila, Chanakya managed the first Mauryan emperor Chandragupta's rise to power at a young age. He is widely credited for having played an important role in the establishment of the Maurya Empire, which was the first empire in archaeologically recorded history to rule most of the Indian subcontinent. Chanakya served as the chief advisor to both Chandragupta and his son Bindusara
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chanakya
