Atlas Shrugged - The first 50 or so pages are boring, but it gets better. If you've paid attention to what you have read, you can skip over most of John Galt's VERY LONG rambling monologue. You'll know it when you get to it. Here is a small excerpt ;

Men who have no courage, pride or self-esteem, men who have no moral sense of their right to their money and are not willing to defend it defend their life, men who apologize for being rich -- will not remain rich for long. They are the natural bait for the swarms of looters who stay under the rocks for centuries, but come crawling out at the first smell of a man who begs to be forgiven for the guilt of owning wealth. They will hasten to relieve him of the guilt - and of his life, as he deserves.”
“Then you will see the rise of the men of the double standard - the men who live by force, yet count on those who live by trade to create the value of their looted money -- the men who are the hitchhikers of virtue. In a moral society, these are the criminals, and the statutes are written to protect you against them. But when a society establishes criminals-by-right and looters-by-law --men who use force to seize the wealth of disarmed victims -- then money becomes its creators’ avenger. Such looters believe it is safe to rob defenseless men, once they have passed a law to disarm them. But their loot becomes the magnet for other looters, who get it from them as they got it. Then the race goes on, not to the ablest at production, but to those most ruthless at brutality. When force is the standard, the murderer wins over the pickpocket. And then that society vanishes, in a spread of ruins and slaughter.”
“Do you wish to know whether that day is coming? Watch money. Money is the barometer of a society’s virtue. When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion - when you see that in order to produce, you need permission from men who produce nothing - when you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors -when you see that men get richer by graft and pull than by work, and your laws don’t protect you against them, but protect them against you - when you see corruption being rewarded and honest becoming self sacrifice - you may know that your society is doomed. “
By the character Francisco d’ Anaconia in Ayn Rand’s book Atlas Shrugged

Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed

You might find this book interesting when contrasted with certain elements of Atlas Shrugged. I think that if you read it, you'll probably see why there is IMO a connection, (and validation) of Rand's almost prophetic work. The business about the modern Montana Economy early in the book is what compares mostly, I think.

Thank you and for including the excerpt too! Very, very interesting !