Every age has its economic lunacies, behaviour that points to a wider problem. It might be the rocketing cost of rare tulip bulbs in old Amsterdam, the Spanish practices of the print unions at their mightiest in old Fleet Street or the madness of the junk bond market a few years later. Today there are plenty to choose from, including the booming sales of cars that can do 180mph when congestion reduces traffic to a crawl; or a housing market that has garages and beach huts selling for more than most people dream of.

But if you want something so weird that, when you stop to consider it, it may well make the historians of tomorrow blanch, it is the current craze for popping over to New York to do the shopping.…  Seguir leyendo »