When the first golden arches appeared in Moscow’s Pushkin Square in 1990, it didn’t matter that it was mid-winter. It was as if the snow in Narnia had begun to melt, and the natural state of things was being returned in glorious technicolor. Russians queued around the corner for a taste of once forbidden patties. “If you can’t go to ...

  The British public is in danger of being crushed under an avalanche of political gossip. The faces of big-name pundits — most prominently Andrew Marr and Piers Morgan — stare out from the sides of buses. A dozen national newspapers splash the latest revelations about “party-gate” or “curry-gate” on their front pages as if they are matters of war ...

  Rising US interest rates, sky-high oil prices, soaring inflation, a foreign war. Then, naturally, a recession. The trajectory may sound awfully familiar, but I’m not describing the present-day American economy. Instead, this is what the US looked like in early 1990. The commodity market now fears a repetition — with another cycle of rising interest rates, expensive oil and ...