Are Mediterranean countries too hot-blooded and passionate to effectively manage their finances? Although a seemingly racist question, examine the evidence. Following the 2002 abandonment of the Drachma in favour of the €, Greece went on a veritable spending spree. Funded via international debt, the country embarked on numerous over-budget projects such as the shambolic 2004 Olympics. When the credit crunch bit, lending countries downgraded Greece’s risk profile accordingly resulting in higher interest rates.

Revert to the present day. Following unsuccessful global firesales of worthless, junk-rated government bonds, Greece has turned with cupped hands to its northward neighbours – prudent, predictable, unimpassioned, stoic (ironically a stoic was also a member of an ancient Greek school of philosophy). After excessive bureaucracy, the Eurozone and International Monetary Fund finally proposed a €110bn financial aid package. Conflicted Germany offered the lion’s share of €22bn for the good of the currency despite considerable opposition from German citizens. But Greece wasn’t the only Mediterranean nation affected – the debt ratings of Spain and Portugal have also been downgraded.

So you’d expect the Greeks to be appreciative of the bail-out. Nope. Once more displaced passion overwhelms fiscal sense. Thousands of public sector employees staged a 48-hour strike in defiance of planned austerity measures to slash the ballooning Greek deficit. Admittedly nobody appreciates the double-edged sword of spending cuts and tax rises but such political and social unrest merely fuels the self-fulfilling prophecy of collapse, further eroding GDP and undermining Eurozone and international confidence. Less confidence means more risk and more risk results in higher interest rates and reluctance to trade.

Even countryman Aristotle advocated prudence… “first, have a definite, clear practical ideal; a goal, an objective. Second, have the necessary means to achieve your ends; wisdom, money, materials, and methods. Third, adjust all your means to that end.” In contrast, modern-day Greeks must adjust the end to the somewhat limited means.

Greeks... fantastic at fighting, bad at business