What Has the Government Done to Our Money? [Reprint of First Edition]

This is the great Murray Rothbard's popular and eminently readable introduction to money and the government destruction thereof. He presents the subject simply and in a way that makes for very interesting reading, in a field that is not known for producing page-turners. The book is short, and provides a solid understanding of money and how it works, even for someone with no background in economics. I don't know why I didn't read this when I was in high school; it should be required reading for every high school student. If thousands of years of history have shown anything at all, they have shown conclusively that one thing we can be absolutely certain of is the addiction of government to the plunder of its own people by debasing its money. Murray Rothbard has shown precisely how this is accomplished, as well as pointing out some of the moral implications of a fraudulent monetary system. It seems to me that when almost everyone spends most of their lives focusing on acquiring, accumulating, and increasing money, they should pay at least minimal attention to the basics of what money fundamentally is, and how readily it can (and inevitably will) be destroyed by a government that has granted itself absolute control over the money mechanism. This book will explain all of that, and it is sure to get your attention.

Monetary theory is one of those subjects that (1) appeals to no one, (2) must be understood by everyone, and (3) is in fact roundly misunderstood by most of the so-called monetary experts. What is the basis for my claim? (1) Try talking to your friends about fiat money, commodity money, and fractional serve banking sometime. If they don't tune you out right away it's only because they're your friends. (2) Money, in an advanced society, is involved on at least one side of almost every transaction. Liberty, prosperity, and peace will not be around long if our ideas about money are flawed. (3) That industrialized societies have been subject to economic crises since the inception of the Industrial Revolution suggests that the most influential minds are influencing us in wrong ways. What can you do? Get Rothbard's book and devour it. You'll learn what money is, how it emerged, and how it's been corrupted by government and banking. You'll also understand why central banking is a polite name for central counterfeiting and why an autonomous gold standard is the only monetary system compatible with civilization. Rothbard's book is an easy read and a must-read. Give copies to your friends. Send copies to the Fed. But read it yourself first. He wrote it for you. George Ford Smith author, "The Flight of the Barbarous Relic"

Other reviewers have already said all that needs to be said, so it is hard to add to the observations that the man had insight into what works in economics - not just theory but fact - and writes in a style that does not intimidate or overwhelm those who are novices. There is probably nothing in this book that will be new to those who are already familiar with the issues of paper currency versus hard currency, but even those persons will be rewarded with an easy to read overview of the subject and will be have an excellent tool for introducing the subject to friends and relatives.

Murray N. Rothbard is now recognised as one of the foremost economists of the last century, and rightly so. Not only does he write in a clear concise manner, but he takes what could be an unintelligible subject and explains it in terms everyone can grasp. In this beautiful hardbound book Rothbard gives us an exceptionally clear, detailed description of what money is and how it has come to be manipulated by governments and central bankers into almost worthless inflationary fiat paper currency. He explains how gold became the most respected and trustworthy currency of choice, how this developed into the gold standard when our paper money was actually backed by a real asset; gold, and then how our governments and particularly their central bankers then manipulated the situation until all we were left with was no gold standard and only fiat paper currency of no "real" value because it no longer had the backing of gold. He then explains very clearly how this situation has led us to where we are now; inflation and the rapidly diminishing purchasing power of the paper money we hold (over the last 30 years the real value of $1 has dropped to around 4 cents!!!!!), unnecessary asset bubbles and the prospect of either hyperinflation or the greatest depression the world has ever seen arriving in the very near future! Mr. Rothbard then rightly argues for a return to the gold standard because of it's inherent automatic adjustment mechanisms due to the scarcity of gold in the ground and the finite quantity already above ground. More importantly he advocates a 100% reserves gold standard which would put an end to fractional reserve banking and thus the ruinous credit creation/oversupply of money by our central bankers and thus an end to rampant inflation as we know it! This would also force our governments to be more accountable to their electorate in that any government allowing an unbalanced economy would face long recessions as the gold standard auto adjustment mechanisms brought it back into equilibrium; henceforth governments would be wise to provide an environment that favoured slow steady growth for their country with minimal boom bust cycles. Furthermore Mr. Rothbard adequately counters the criticisms of his conclusions & recommendations in detail. I think most of us that bother to look further than our noses and not live with our head in the sand now realise the United States financial position(in particular) is untenable in the long term and there is going to be a very painful outcome either slowly creeping through the financial world in a dollar crisis OR precipitated by a large financial event, like the probable implosion of huge OTC derivatives positions. Either way this will herald the end of the world's latest foray into fiat paper currency; it will fail as it must and as fiat currencies always have in the past. When that happens, HOPEFULLY we will return to a 100% gold standard where our paper money, gold grams or whatever are 100% backed b

Rothbard writes this book in a style not often found in todays politically charged books. Rather than ranting and throwing shots at opposition, Rothbard cafefully walks the reader through economic history and theory, and very cafefully dissects those with opposing viewpoints. This books will leave you wanting more, as its a quick read (if your like me it will be done in a day or two). For further reading, I suggest "The case against the Fed" also by Rothbard. For a complete book on Rothbard's view of economics, see "Man, Economy, and State"