The Almighty Dollar

“A lucid work of economic history.”—Kirkus Reviews

“The history of the dollar is longer and more interesting than people realize. Brendan Greeley, in his The Almighty Dollar, provides the ideal guide to understanding the world’s most important currency.”—Tyler Cowen, New York Times bestselling author of The Great Stagnation and Average Is Over

“Despite being a brilliant and surprisingly fun read, in writing a history of the dollar Greeley inadvertently gives us a new history of money. His key insight is that money is not some kind of magical barter-replacement device or a ring of confidence. Rather, it’s a product. Seen this way the history and the future of the dollar stand far less assured than many assume.”—Mark Blyth, author of Inflation: A Guide for Users and Losers

“Greeley’s splendid quest, from Saxon mines to stable coins, makes an epic story vividly accessible. Brimming with startling details, this is also serious financial history with a conclusion ripe for our unsettled times: rulers and borders come and go, but the dollar has outlasted our illusions of sovereignty and control.”—Evan Osnos, New York Times bestselling author of The Haves and Have-Yachts

“Come for the sweeping—and accessible—history of the dollar and the faith people have put in it. Stay for the delightful cameos about the Saxon miners searching for Joachimsthaler, Maryland bills of credit, Hawarden, Iowa scrip, and Andrew Brimmer’s quest to get the Federal Reserve to allocate credit.”—William D. Cohan, New York Times bestselling author of Power Failure and The Last Tycoons

“This is a reporter’s book of detailed, engaging stories and a historian’s book—telling a tale that is stranger, longer, and more rich with significance than any economist’s fable.”—Rebecca Spang, author of Stuff and Money in the Time of the French Revolution

“This is a mesmerizing and fascinating book, breathtakingly researched and spectacularly written, that connects the big story of the dollar—and indeed of other currencies—to the actual experiences of very ordinary people whose lives are transformed, and often wrecked, by money.”—Harold James, author of Seven Crashes and The End of Globalization

“With curiosity, good humor, and a keen eye for human stories, Greeley guides us from centuries-old silver mines to the ongoing machinations of the Federal Reserve Board. Myths about economic sovereignty and objective monetary policy give way to a clear-eyed understanding of a global dollar that has always benefited some at the expense of others.”—Seth Rockman, author of Plantation Goods: A Material History of American Slavery

“There has never been a better time to understand the US dollar, its strengths, its weaknesses, its history and more importantly, its profound role in not just in American but global finance. Brendan Greeley has done us all a service with this terrific, erudite, breath-taking story of the Almighty US Dollar, which, I now know thanks to his scholarship, came well before the USA itself!”—David McWilliams, #1 international bestselling author of Money: A Story of Humanity