This is one of those books that beg the question, why did the author write it? He seems to be a bright guy who knows a little about a lot of things, and has read some popular works on history and economics. His accounts of these things range from intriguing to boilerplate speechifying with no discernible content. But my main objection is not the unevenness of the material, it's that it doesn't fit together. It certainly doesn't make a case that economics is a religion, or that it went wrong, or that professional economists are money gods or are facing twilight.

As best I can tell, and I admit to guessing, there are three reasons the author compares economics to religion. It is central to modern life, most people have only vague and faulty intuition about it, and economic experts are more like priests seeking respect and power than scientists uncovering truth. I'm willing to grant some force to each of those points of similarity, although I am nowhere near as certain as the author seems to be.

But for the analogy to be useful, it has to illustrate other aspects of economics that are non-obvious, that we can only see by considering the comparison to religion. I can't find any attempt to do this. The author is content to observe three correspondences and claim he's made a useful point. I could say the same three things about fashion, politics or nutrition among many other things.

The best part of this book is when the author forgets about his main point and tells some stories about history or economic theory. Many of these make excellent stand-alone essays. The exposition is strong, the argument weak. Moreover the style is graceful when telling stories, pedestrian and patronizing when teaching.

The low point of the book is when the author tries to apply his thesis--such as it is--to the last ten years. His knowledge about events seems to be drawn from fulminating op-eds written by people who knew nothing of the issues until the chance arose to say "I told you so." His theories fail to illuminate either actual events or what he imagines them to have been, and the word "illuminate" is euphemism given how dim the theory is in the first place.

I can't recommend this book overall, although it's not unpleasant to read, and you will learn a lot of things. Rewritten as "A Random Walk Down Economic History," with more humility and less argument, it could be a pretty good book.

Draws interesting parallels between organized religion and modern currency. Asks a number of intriguing questions, including: Where does money come from? How is it that we never see it, but it allows us to buy houses? What happens when people stop believing in money's power?