Free Lunch: How the Wealthiest Americans Enrich Themselves at Government Expense (and Stick You with the Bill) (Hardcover)

~ David Cay Johnston (Author) "AT BANDON DUNES, ON OREGON'S RUGGED AND REMOTE SOUTHERN coast, men at play pretend they're in the eighteenth-century Scotland of Adam Smith..." (more)
Key Phrases: bass pro, land title insurance, title insurance industry, United States, Adam Smith, New York (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Johnston, a New York Times investigative reporter, has spent his 40-year career exposing collusion between government officials and private sector entities as they enrich the rich and ignore consequences for middle-class laborers and the poor. In Perfectly Legal, he focused on hidden inequities in the tax system. This volume is a broader examination of collusion and unfairness, ranging from subsidies for professional sports stadiums to secret payouts to multinational corporate chief executives. At the base of Johnston's journalistic indictment are the highly paid lobbyists working Congress, state legislatures, county commissions, city councils and government regulatory agencies. Johnston also cites the culpability of George W. Bush in his roles as professional baseball team owner, Texas governor and U.S. president, and targets well-known tycoons such as Donald Trump, Warren Buffett and George Steinbrenner as well as lesser-recognized beneficiaries who own golf courses and insurance companies and energy consortiums. Heroes appear occasionally, such as Remy Welling, an Internal Revenue Service investigator who blew the whistle on improper tax breaks for the wealthy and lost her job. Johnston writes compellingly to show how government-private sector collusion affects the middle class and the poor. (Jan.)
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Review

“If you’re concerned about congressional earmarks, stock options (especially backdated options), hedge fund tax breaks, abuse of eminent domain, subsidies to sports teams, K Street lobbyists, the state of our health-care system, to say nothing of the cavernous gap between rich and poor, you’ll read this fine book—as I did—with a growing sense of outrage. Free Lunch makes it clear that it’s high time for ‘We the People’ to stand up and be counted.”
—John C. Bogle, founder and former chairman, The Vanguard Group

“With clarity, conciseness, and cool, fact-saturated analysis, Mr. Johnston, the premier investigative reporter on how industry and commerce shift risks and costs to taxpayers, sends the ultimate message to all Americans—either we demand to have a say or we will continue to pay, pay, and pay.”
—Ralph Nader

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 352 pages
• Publisher: Portfolio Hardcover; 1 edition (December 27, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1591841917
• ISBN-13: 978-1591841913
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (103 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #194,411 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

271 of 282 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars How 1% of Americans Take From the Other 99% and Why We Tolerate It, January 3, 2008

By	Frederick S. Goethel "wildcatcreekbooks" (Central Valley, CA) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

Amazon Verified Purchase

The author has written a well documented and detailed account of how less than 1% of Americans are getting rich of the backs of the other 99%. And, it isn't just individuals who are reaping millions of dollars from taxpayers...it's also corporations.

Some of the items presented in detail in the book include how one of the largest baseball teams in the country destroyed a public park for a new stadium, had it paid for by the citizens, and then gave payback to politicians who helped.

Or the two major hunting and fishing chains that got millions and millions in tax subsidies to build stores based on false and unsustainable promises, and continue to try to rape the treasuries of communities across the country with more false promises.

Or the company who built a call center in Buffalo using tax subsidies and sold it to the public through a newspaper owned by the same company.

These are just several examples of the material detailed in the book. In addition to showing who is taking, and how, the author details who is fighting back and how they are trying to in an era when the courts and politicians are held by corporate interests.

The book is well written, and well documented. In addition, the author took what can be a very dry subject and made extremely readable. This book should be read by every American, particularly in light of the upcoming presidential elections. Some familiar names will pop out at you as individuals who made their fortunes off our backs.

108 of 115 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars feeding at the public trough, January 3, 2008

By	Eric A. Isaacson (San Diego, CA USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

How can our government be so expensive, yet so ineffective?

Showing it's no accident that our political institutions too often serve the interests of the rich and powerful, Mr. Johnston "follows the money" -- the money that buys special favors, and the money that's siphoned out of our pockets to pay for them.

This is an eminently readable and informative book, that deserves a large audience. But be warned -- being informed can produce outrage!

Eric Alan Isaacson

82 of 87 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Other Things Adam Smith Said, February 7, 2008

By	!Edwin C. Pauzer (New York City) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)

One thing you can expect when you open a book by David Cay Johnston is narrative that reads like a drama unfolding except that the plot is present-day America and the story is how the wealthy are getting richer at the expense of the middle class. Hence the title "Free Lunch," where the wealthy steal it with government approval, are paid to take it, or get it free, courtesy of the same who hands the bill over to us.

At the very beginning, Johnston explains what the invisible hand of Adam Smith means, for the benefit of those who know it and for those who only think they do--of which there are more than enough of the latter. Smith postulated that a free market economy creates competition that serves the common good but, (and here's the kicker), does not work if government provides them bounty (subsidies), or allows them to collude to keep prices high. He also stated that there would be enterprises that would operate to seek bounties only, the equivalent of modern corporate welfare.

Johnston provides chapter after fascinating chapter of how government at all levels offers break after break which is consistently picked up by Average Joe Taxpayer. Such "bounties" include:

· Misuse of eminent domain, which is supposed to mean appropriating land for the common good such as a new highway or airport. Now it is used to support developers who wish to profit at the expense of the homeowner.

· Tax breaks. Not only do companies such as Wal-Mart, Cabela, or Bass Pro insist on property tax breaks that decimate the local economy rather than improve it, but they might even insist on keeping the sales tax. Communities may not see a return on their investment for decades.

· Government intervention in the form of legislation that may even benefit large companies at the expense of the citizen such as "free-market" energy as espoused by Ken Lay that eventually cost Californians exorbitant charges for no additional electricity generated.

· Kids who take student loans are finding out that what they thought was a loan at six percent suddenly became eighteen percent guaranteeing that they will pay far more than they borrowed for years to come, and the lender is guaranteed no risk.

· Our government is also lavishing subsidies onto for-profit health care companies that consistently look for ways to deny claims. No subsidies go to nonprofit health systems even though studies show they offer superior care. (Adam Smith also said: "What improves the circumstances of the greater part can never be regarded as an inconveniency to the whole").

· The grand prize, which is our current administration in the form of George W. Bush who sponsored a drug plan for seniors that was worked on (behind closed doors) by Billy Tauzin (R), Max Baucus (D), and John Breaux (D). These "representatives of the people" guaranteed that Adam Smith's dictum of seeking the lowest possible price would be ignored. Their bill guaranteed that our government would not be allowed to negotiate the price of drugs for its citizens even though it would make purchases in bulk.

In each of the above, there has not only been collusion by companies and industries, but also a feckless government that has given its blessing with collusion of its own, subsidies, and bluster of threats to investigate wrong-doing, with investigations that never quite materialize.

Having read his previous work "Perfectly Legal" I was eager to get my hands on this book, and I was not disappointed. In twenty-seven chapters that span the length of less than 300 pages, you will discover how industry and government have actually worked to first deceive, then gouge the average hard-working taxpayer. Any one of these chapters is a revelation that made me open this book at every opportunity.

This is the kind of book you can be sorry that it comes to an end, and also be glad that it does (because it is too painful).

If this book cannot stir the most politically apathetic into action, nothing will.

Maybe they'll just have to see the bill first.




Also recommended:

"Perfectly Legal" by David Cay Johnston
"The Conscience of a Liberal" by Paul Krugman
"Sicko" (DVD) by Michael Moore
"The Broken Branch: How Congress Is Failing America and How to Get It Back on Track (Institutions of American Democracy)"