In case someone actually wants to read Atlas Shrugged, I did actually read it. It's a fictional world where the strawmen business people are happen to always be

In case someone actually wants to read Atlas Shrugged, I did actually read it. It's a fictional world where the strawmen business people are happen to always be good and moral, and are oppressed by the strawman government people who are bad and greedy. Also the author occasionally has her characters go on multi-page speeches, for instance about how we ought to be using gold for currency. In case it's not clear, Atlas Shrugged is a piece of fiction and using it to draw parallels to reality is like saying "I recommend watching Disney's The Lion King. Zoos keep hogs apart from lions because they think they can't get along". As a sidenote to balance my scathing review, I rather liked one of her earlier novels, Fountainhead. If you want to read an Ayn Rand novel I'd go for that one, as it's more about a type of "rugged individualism" than an economic system. It directly grapples at the question of the nature of invention/innovation: whether as a product of individual genius or standing on the shoulder of giants. Obviously the novel has an answer but it's not exactly a solved question in real life, and at least some of Ellsworth Toohey's quotes aren't half bad.