catastrophic when times are bad. Homer and Sylla describe normal contracted rates, not realized rates net of those costs, as 10% — 40% in Sumer and Babylonia, 6% - 18% in ancient Greece, 5% — 24% in Egypt, and 4% — 12+% in Rome and the Byzantine Empire.* After higher rates in the dark ages, European mortga

ke anyone’s land. By contrast, the Soviet Union incorporated huge swaths of post-war Poland and Germany. If we compare the United States to Assyria, Babylonia, Persia, Greece, and Rome—or for that matter, Ottoman Turkey, Spain, Portugal, Japan, Russia, Britain, and France—we can only conclude that the Unite