Funny Money [Hardcover]

Paul Hellyer (Author)

Book Description

Great Read.

Product Details

• Hardcover
• ISBN-10: 0969439423
• ISBN-13: 978-0969439424
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,799,064 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not so Funny Devils in the Banking & Financial Systems, July 27, 2009

By 

D. V. Short "Enzo Short" (Orkney, UK) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Funny Money (Hardcover)

At the time of writing this it has been over 6 months since the British banks have been given a lifeline of billions of Pounds to help support their unwarranted survival. In the meantime small businesses have still been waiting to get business loans, and jobs have been lost in the real economy - Why? The banks have been lending money overseas at higher interest rates, and have already been returning to the life of bonuses. This is the nature of the beast that books such as "Funny Money" have been describing: A corrupt, heartless money supply system supported by governments and their economic advisors, and motivated by unscrupulous money lords whom I will call plutocrats.

I would give the book 6 stars if I could because the book's text is written for ordinary folk (most of us) with common sense (hopefully enough of us !). The Canadian author, Paul Hellyer, describes viable systems that can bridge the divide between economics on paper and economics in the real world, showing that current worldwide monetary policies have been playing central and divisive rôles in maintaining that divide. The book's publication date (1994) belies its current relevance, as is evidenced by another world financial crisis that followed in 2008.

Paul Hellyer explains how private bankers have been creating, in their worldwide, unbridled avarice over the centuries, legally fraudulent money to lay claim to wealth created by others. He describes what he calls neoclassical economic policies (Now apparently known as neoliberalism as documented in "A Brief History of Neoliberalism - ISBN: 0199283273). The core malignancy to the economies of all nations with such policies is the world's private banking and financial systems, for they have given us 45 recessions and depressions in 200 years (with more to come). In the "bad times" it is the "good times" for banks to take possession of the collateral of defaulting debtors who are unable to repay loans having usurious compound interest rates. Big businesses also buy up the assets of smaller businesses that are unable to survive the downturn. It happens every time in cycles. And thanks every time to the deluded politicians believing their jobs will be lost if banks go bankrupt, they glibly hand over taxpayers' money to bail out the banks again. Then we go back to start again from what my first paragraph says, ad infinitum and ad nauseam.

The author tells it like it is, and should you read it, you might realise that it is an ideal book for prescribed reading at schools and colleges. A nation of citizens brought up on such knowledge would make truly educated choices in selecting their nation's leaders. However, such a prescription would doubtlessly not be allowed by governments, because a morally educated populace would undermine the greed of those bent on stealing the wealth created laboriously by others.

Paul Hellyer has been one of the world's most economically enlightened and prescient politicians, as he has even understood how crude and blunt the use of interest rates has been in controlling inflation, amongst other things. The unprejudiced and reasonable reader will be able to decide whether his suggested reform policies are workable. His most critical policies dealing with bankers' greed are something that Britain's most economically enlightened politician, Vince Cable, has been unable to grasp (even in 2009). Most people today are mindlessly intimidated into labouring under modern feudal systems caused by extortionist policies, applied by governments, and motivated by plutocrats (top-o-the-echelon bankers and financiers). The serious conundrum is that most people find what Paul Hellyer tells us so extraordinarily incomprehensible, because most people haven't realised the inter-connectedness of everything in the "human universe". He and his ilk are ahead of their time, and it is astounding how few people are prepared, willing or able to understand the insights shown in their expositions. In about 1974 when Hellyer sent an outline of a book on economic reform to his publisher, they rejected it outright, saying their "editors believe the economists (whom Hellyer appeared to contradict) cannot all be wrong." So today we still have, at best, "flat-earth" politicians, like the partially enlightened Vince Cable in Britain, believing "boom and bust" are eternally inevitable. In the meantime the rest of us must continue to suffer laboriously, go die in inexcusable wars, sell our houses to pay for care, die in poverty, or anything else to ensure the bankers and financiers remain safe and rich.

Companion DVDs and related books to this book could be:
· "The Money Masters" - (History of money. Not to be confused with DVDs on currency trading)
· "Money as Debt" DVDs - (What money is really. Came out as Parts 1 (2006) and 2 (2009), and are based on Hellyer's "Funny Money" book. They give an outline of what is shown in more detail by the aforesaid "Money Masters")
· "Gloom, Doom, & Very Funny Money" - (Gives a comical description of money's function in an economy. It is an out of print, but potentially collectors' book that can be bought 2nd hand) - ISBN: 1853401390. I wish a demand for it would bring it back in print. It would be an excellent book for educating pupils at school - if the powers that be allow it, of course.
· "Web of Debt" - (Causes of, and solutions for the 2008 financial global crisis) - ISBN: 0979560829

Long-lasting, democratic solutions to the problems of plutocratic control of governments may be exercised through the International Simultaneous Policy Organisation (ISPO) [...]