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Trump tests the American attitude to pain
It’s not just bread and circuses anymore.
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Mr Trump's team insists that using tariffs to reorientate the American economy will produce an economic nirvana in the long term.
PHOTO: AFP
Gillian Tett
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Two millennia ago, the Roman poet Decimus Junius Juvenalis (“Juvenal”) decried the political phenomenon of “bread and circuses”.
Back in AD100, the Roman Empire was crushed by so much debt and income inequality (sound familiar?) that its emperors tried to placate a restive public with free “bread” (that is, short-term bribes) and gladiatorial contests or “circuses”. The idea was to distract them – while ignoring the need for structural reform. Is this happening again?
