Our Money: how to shrink government, boost business, eliminate poverty and make the economy work properly for everyone

Money is just about the cleverest thing that humankind has ever invented but we have been using it in just about the stupidest way possible. This book explains what money is, how we abuse it, and how we could use it to make our economy work much better for the benefit of everyone.

Exploring our relationship with money, we discover that our desire to possess it rather than use it is at the root of our economic problems, and changing how we feel about money is the key to solving most of them.

The nonsense of orthodox economic thinking is exposed, and reforms to our economic system are proposed, shedding light on a plausible way forward while delivering a serious poke with a sharp stick to our "nothing-can-be-done" complacency.

The author has spent the last 30 years as a self-employed foot-soldier engaged in the daily struggle to keep cash flowing in sufficient quantity through a variety of businesses, and has tackled the subject of our economy from this perspective.

Yes, it's a book about economics but it's been written by someone who has tried and failed to understand economics textbooks and habitually nods off when reading the finance pages in the newspaper.

The book is aimed at the ordinary punter who's trying to make sense of an economic system that's patently dysfunctional and has an interest in finding out how we can harness the magic of money to abolish taxes, shrink government, boost business, eliminate poverty and ensure that everyone has enough money to meet their basic needs without having to beg, borrow or steal.

Malcolm Henry spent 8 months in 1979-80 as a trainee sub-editor, which was his first and last proper job. Having escaped the office to learn the trade of a boat-builder he started his first business in 1984, designing, building and repairing wooden boats.

Since then since then he has taken a lead role in a wide range of business activities including outdoor education, software development, tourism, R&D, construction, and more.

He has spent every working day immersed in the commercial realities of small businesses, experiencing at close quarters how our economy works.

In 2001 he set up QEI Projects Ltd as a vehicle for his consultancy work and a variety of R&D projects that seek to find better ways of doing things. He provides his clients with a useful mix of analytical skills and pragmatism that have been developed over 30 years of working out how to get things done within budget and on time.

He has applied all of this experience to developing his view of the economy, its dysfunction, and how it could be reformed to work more effectively, all of which are incorporated in this book.