Typically, lenders will demand ever higher rates of interest from spendthrift governments as public debts grow.
Or, as other groups meld at ever higher rates, blacks could continue to be outsiders -- seen but not seen.
Politicians, such as Italy's new prime minister, Matteo Renzi (see picture), have realised that taxpayers are fed up with paying ever higher rates.
At worst, this could happen uncontrollably, with investors charging ever higher rates as the government's finances grow weaker and weaker.
Unfortunately, investors have lost confidence in the Greek government's ability to walk this tightrope – so they have been demanding ever higher rates of interest to compensate for the risk that they might not get their money back.
However, after the threat of financial implosion receded this year, and as investor confidence crept back, banks and building societies began to offer ever higher rates on fixed accounts to tie in customers' cash and – critically – shore up their battered capital bases.
Greece, like all borrowers, simply offers securities at ever higher rates until it finds the needed buyers.
On the flip side, what Timothy Noah has described as the "Great Divergence -- a period starting in the 1970s characterized by ever higher rates of income inequality valorized by the right -- has weakened the institution of marriage for many.
Simply legislating for higher living standards, for example by calling for ever-higher rates for the "living wage" won't fool anyone.
With their subscriber base slowly dwindling — Brannon says that subscriptions dropped an average of 0.75 percent over the last four quarters — cable companies are forced to make up the loss by charging an ever-smaller audience ever-higher rates.
