Additionally in 2008-9 threehree Baltic states suffered their own financial meltdowns driven by the credit booms and reckless lending of the Scandinavian banks that dominate the region.
But after Coven utterly wasted him last year (as a monosyllabic Frankenstein's sex-buffoon) it is Evan Peters who is most impressive, prone to wild fits of rage and quieter emotional meltdowns.
When I ask him why the workers hide their faces despite risking their lives to stop the meltdowns spinning out of control, he says bluntly: "The result is what counts.
ECONOMIC woes, unpopular wars and nuclear meltdowns have eroded public trust in the authorities.
If the cycle of falling asset prices, insolvency and credit constriction is excessive, the government may have to step in and buy up bad assets en masse, as has often occurred in other financial meltdowns (see article).Even without such drastic action, the economy and the financial system are becoming dependent on the taxpayer.
The costs of any such meltdowns are difficult to estimate, but when all is said and done the latest one is bound to be judged one of the more expensive.
Look at emerging markets, though, and it is clear that people think it is worth paying to send money from one place to another and to keep their savings safe.Regulators and their political masters now have to ensure that the benefits of a vibrant and innovative banking system are ever more widely spread and meltdowns become ever rarer.
If financial markets followed the normal bell-shaped distribution curve, in which meltdowns are very rare, the stockmarket crash of 1987, the interest-rate turmoil of 1992 and the 2008 crash would each be expected only once in the lifetime of the universe.This is changing the way many financial firms think about risk, says Greg Case, chief executive of Aon, an insurance broker.
Despite several low-level nuclear accidents, Japan's power generators such as Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO), owner of the Fukushima plant, have sworn blind that their safety records are exemplary and there is no danger of any meltdowns.
Another possibility is that redistribution tends to substitute for shaky borrowing by non-rich households, of the sort that can undermine growth or cause nasty credit meltdowns:In their 2011 paper Messrs Berg and Ostry note that more unequal societies do poorly on social indicators such as educational attainment, even after controlling for income levels.
Having stuck with Indonesia as other firms bailed out during one or other of the country's periodic meltdowns, the Japanese are being rewarded for their perseverance.
