Maybe all you need is love, but money sure helps.

I had no interest in economics in college, either. I belonged to that great tradition of academic bohemia which stretches from the fifteenth century riots of François Villon's to the Phish tours of the present day. For University hipsters, there is (no doubt Villon mentions this in his Petit Testament) nothing more pathetic than taking business courses.

My friends and I were above that. In our classes we studied literature, anthropology, and how to make ceramics. We were seeking, questing, growing. Specifically, we were growing sideburns and leg hair, according to gender. It did not occur to us that the frat-pack dolts and Tri-Delt tweeties, hurrying to get to Econ 101 on time (in their square fashion), were the real intellectuals.

-- P.J. O'Rourke, Eat the Rich

Not unlike O'Rourke before me, I spent my college years writing papers about deconstructing gender identity tropes in slave narratives and discussing Foucault over cheap wine. I grew a ratty beard, and my band played a benefit to raise awareness of the struggles of indigenous peasants in southern Mexico. The closest I got to economics was reading neo-marxist critiques of contemporary film theory.

Also not unlike O'Rourke, I've grown up and found myself a little more concerned that things like "current account deficits" are a larger issue than whether or not I wrote a bad check for beer. Unfortunately, I understand current account deficits now about as well as I understood then why the bank was sending me overdraft notices about a $5 check to "The Beer Barn."

With this background I recently picked up a copy of Benn Steil and Manuel Hinds' new book, Money, Markets, and Sovereignty. The amount of knowledge packed into these short 246 pages is astounding. What's even more, the book is accessible even to me.

Prior to reading Money, Markets, and Sovereignty, I long held the belief that money was a ridiculous concept. After all, what but mass delusion results in billions of people trading small pieces of paper for actual objects of intrinsic value? As it turns out, the answer is something like mass delusion. But I now find it anything but ridiculous. After all, this mass delusion is, essentially, what makes the world work. It's the same mass delusion that allows us to live without constant fear of being hit by a car or contracting a deadly disease. We all go along because, well, things just wouldn't work otherwise.

That's not to say that things can't go wrong. They can. Horribly, horribly wrong, in fact. Take, for example, the fact that $5 USD will buy you a 100 Trillion Zimbabwean dollar note on Ebay. Or, for an example a bit closer to home, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Steil and Hinds' book presents an easy to digest history of money and monetary policy, concluding with present day issues that face central bankers and governments the world over. The authors outline the unique role the US economy has played since 1944 saw the signing of the Bretton Woods Agreements, and even more so since the Bretton Woods exchange markets closed in 1973. Most important, though, Steil and Hinds make exceptionally clear the urgency with which the US needs to get its house (the Fed) in order if we are to prevent further deterioration into a global financial crisis that will make the past year look like a cakewalk.

Those who recoil at the idea that globalization could actually be helping, rather than hurting, global standards of living will certainly find some of the authors' points hard to swallow. I would recommend reading their thesis with an open mind, though, as it's quite convincing. And I invite anyone with alternative readings to post them in the comments for future review.