Websources: Resources For Understanding Money

It is important for us to understand money and the forces that generates. As the subprime mess continues to unravel, it is time to remind ourselves of money basics. The web has some terrific resources. It provides amazing essays, speeches, interviews and books. It will be one of the functions of the space to provide contact information and brief reviews of them.

This feature we will look at different online discoveries, give brief descriptions and thoughts and provide accurate addresses.

While I do not believe that money and capitalism are synonymous, it would behoove us to understand capitalist principles and their relationship to money as well as to freedom, effectiveness, efficiency and authentic progress. Money and capitalism frequently get a bad rap. Howard Bloom objects. In his online teaser for his long-anticipated book (still in draft form though available through his website), Reinventing Capitalism: Putting Soul In The Machine: A Radical Re-Perception Of Western Civilization, Bloom takes a remarkable view of our faith and belief systems from a systemic economic perspective. He takes issue with those naysayers who are so negative about the moral implications of money and capitalism.

The story the anti-capitalists tell is WRONG. Since its first beginnings, capitalism has been a non-stop liberator, an emotional-upgrader, and a full-speed-ahead creator of new forms of empowerment, new frontiers of human possibility. That's something trade has always done--taken one man's boring overflow and passed it to those who hungered for it dearly. In modern terms we hide this human element behind words like arbitrage. But trade that seeks out surpluses and satisfies deep physical and emotional needs is one of the capitalism's unspoken central creeds.

Howard Bloom is an amazing communicator and thinker. Perhaps best known for his role in defining the music industry of the 60s and 70s, his abilities to integrate science, economics, history and anthropology bring unique context and perspective to the money forces. If you have not had the opportunity to read two of his previous books, The Lucifer Principle: A Scientific Expedition into the Forces of History and Global Brain: The Evolution of Mass Mind from the Big Bang to the 21st Century, I recommend them. They are among the most intriguing, sense making views of society and human development ever written.

The online version is like a movie trailer. Combining quick observations with visually enticing graphics, our Bloom extols the virtues of Western economics and its capacities for improving the human condition. It is worth the trip.

The web gives us access to little gems. Among them I encourage you to read a remarkable 2200 word essay entitled "I, Pencil." Considerably shorter than Ayn Rand's Atlas Shrugged, "I, Pencil" details the "family tree" of a common lead pencil to illustrate the complexities of modern economies and the stunning efficiencies with which billions of people contribute to the creation and dissemination of goods and services.

"I, Pencil" was written in 1958 by Leonard E. Read, founder and president of the Foundation for Economic Education. It remains a vibrant and honest description of the creation process 50 years after it was first published

The web also let us set down new talent. This week' s edition of the online journal, Advisor Perspectives, gives us access to the thoughts of Niall Ferguson. Ferguson is the Laurence A. Tisch Professor of History at Harvard University and William Ziegler Professor at the Harvard Business School. He is also a resident faculty member of the Minda de Gundzburg Center for European Studies, and a Senior Research Fellow at Oxford and Stanford Universities. He has also written a superb "history of money" book, The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World (To be reviewed later in this space).

The interview provides an informed view of current economics, and anticipates its prognoses for 2009 and beyond. While many newspaper columnists and magazine writers discuss the same issues, few are as informed about money and economic history. Ferguson addresses such issues as international implications and ramifications of bailout packages, fiscal stimuli, asset correlation, bonds, the viability of gold-based economies and commodities. He even has some cogent observations about so our larger institutions. "Broadly speaking, we can't breathe life back into the dinosaurs. But we are trying to make their death as painless as possible."

The interview is articulate, easy to read and provocative.

The World Wide Web is a virtually endless source of material and resources. This will be a regular feature. Come back next Thursday for reviews of three of them.

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