Broken Money: Why Our Financial System Is Failing Us and How We Can Make It Better By Lyn Alden (kindle)

Broken Money explores the history of money through the lens of technology. Politics can affect things temporarily and locally, but technology is what drives things forward globally and permanently.

The book's goal is for the listener to walk away with a deep understanding of money and monetary history, both in terms of theoretical foundations and in terms of practical implications. From shells to gold, from papyrus bills of exchange to central banks, and from the invention of the telegraph to the creation of Bitcoin, Lyn Alden walks the listener through the emergence of new technologies that have shaped what we use as money over the ages. And beyond that, Alden explores the concept of what money is at its very foundation to give the listener a framework to analyze and compare different types of monetary technologies and monetary theories.

The book also takes a distinctively human look at how money impacts the lives of real people, and how new monetary technologies shape the power structures within society.