Thursday, July 16, 2015

History Books And Modern Greece

Making my way through Churchill's A History of the English Speaking Peoples, I'm currently around the year 1150.

Bonus tidbit: In the 900s, England was semi-conquered by the Danes and assorted Vikings. The Norman conquest in 1066+ put England in the orbit of the much more Continentally important French instead of the peripheral Danes and Norwegians. That was better for the English in the long run.

In any case, in history books like this one, the years sweep by quickly. You can go through 10-20 years of developments in no time at all. It gives you a much larger scope than that which you have in the time you live. Right now, a lot of people are worried about upcoming elections or Planned Parenthood butchering and selling baby parts*. Allow me to suggest that graphs like this one are much more important from a historical perspective.

Greece's population by age.
It's a mathematical fact that 20 years from now, the majority of Greece's population will be over 60. Unless they import a culture-changing number of foreigners, by 2035, Greece will be a 3rd world country regardless of what happens to their loans.

* - Guilty as charged.

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