Thanks to the financial crisis, we’re all economists now

I was standing with a cheerful huddle at a farm near Monyash in the Peak District, seeing off the Four Shires Bloodhounds on a foggy November Sunday. The hounds bayed and the horses stamped, and I wished I could still run well enough to be the quarry. In the same huddle was a friend who farms not far from where we live; he and I used to train together when we were younger and he was a fine middle-distance (and I a hopeful long-distance) runner.