Author: Philip Coggan
Philip Coggan takes us on a whirlwind journey through the development of trade, commerce, and economic progress across the globe starting from 10,000 years ago!
In case you need any re-enforcement of the importance of finance, this circle-of-life quote sums it up at a personal level.
“Finance plays a very important role in the economy. It allows us to manage our lifetime expenditure. When we start work, we have little capital and need to borrow money to buy a house or consumer goods like cars. When we are middle-aged and earn a higher salary, the debts are paid off and we build up money for our retirement. When we are old, we live off the income from our savings. In aggregate, the old lend money to the young.”
There are many places in the book where I learnt the origin of words. For instance the word “spinster” gets its origin in the medieval times (mid-1300s to be precise) when unmarried women ended up with lower income jobs like spinning thread and yarn. This gave rise to the word “spinster” to denote a woman who is single and has passed marriageable age.
The same period gave us another memorable phrase — by hook or by crook. For firewood, workers and peasants were allowed to gather any twigs they could pull off hedges and trees from royal forests, with tools known as hooks and crooks (hence the phrase “by hook or by crook”).
Another great perspective on the relative duration of economic phases is captured in the following quote:
“If the history of Homo sapiens were fitted into a single day, farming only began after 10pm at night, and the Industrial Revolution did not occur until 11.57pm.”
I loved this book and if you are an economics and history junkie like me, you will love it too.
