Cameron himself didn’t want Brexit to happen. He thought a referendum would finally silence opponents who felt otherwise, including many in his own Conservative Party. Yet he also sympathized with British citizens who “resent the interference in our national life by what they see as unnecessary rules and regulation” and tried to leverage that resentment in negotiations for a better deal with the EU. When the referendum was held in 2016 and Leave won with 52 percent of the vote, Cameron resigned the next day in disgrace. The UK spent the next four years negotiating the terms of its divorce with continental Europe. In 2020, they reached an agreement, and Brexit became official reality.

The UK cycled through three prime ministers during those seven tumultuous years. But the Bank of England had just one governor that whole time, whose tenure from 2013 to 2020 overlapped this cautionary tale with eerie precision: Mark Carney.