Perfectly Legal: The Covert Campaign to Rig Our Tax System to Benefit the Super Rich-And Cheat Everybody Else

If you are wondering whether you should read this book, I strongly say YES. I just finished reading Perfectly Legal, I have a Ph.D. in economics and business administration and was not sure that I would learn that much. Boy, was I wrong!What an outstanding book! He writes so cleanly and clearly, it is no surprise he has a Pulitzer for stories he has written for the New York Times. The research and logic is world class and very disturbing. We need to fix the situations described before it is too late. To do this we need to get our friends and associates to read it as well. Get the word out. Buy it and give it to your friends, (you get free shipping if you buy more than one :-) suggest it to book clubs, talk about when ever you can. The Miami Herald book club is reading and reviewing it this month. We need more of this to happen. Dave Johnston has written an investigative masterpiece in the tradition of Upton Sinclair book The Jungle. He and has done a great service to America in writing this book! As Upton Sinclair created a political revolution in 1906 when his book was published - this book should create a revolution in 2004. If we do not fix what David has identified, America and the world will indeed be in a sorry state. Just one example out of hundreds and hundreds from the book that must be reversed. David points out that the upper 10% of U.S. tax payers saw their income rise by 88% and their share of national income go from 33% to 48% from 1970 to 2000. The the bottom 90% of US taxpayers saw their income stagnate and their share of national income went from 67% to 52%. And as David points out if the current "Perfectly Legal" tax loopholes continue, this disparity with grow!Your future and your family's future are in the balance. This is not a republican or democratic issue, it's an American issue! America will not be great nation if it becomes a nation of haves and have nots. Get the word out about this book, e-mail your family and friends, it is the most important thing you can do this year. We need the changes that Upton Sinclar's book brought about, and David Cay Johnston's book can do that. It is even more important to our contry in 2004 than Sinclar's was in 1906. To make this happen we must do our part. The next time a friend invites you dinner, bring this book instead of a bottle of wine or 6 pack of beer. Your friends will forget the wine or beer they will never forget this book! And they will thank you over and over for it. My friends have.Jerry Fisher

I am a traditional conservative who has been bothered by tough coverage of the tax code in WSJ for years, but I am deeply troubled by Johnson's book. I have spoken with three tax attorneys who read it and found it accurate. What upsets me most is that THEY are not outraged. It does not do justice to this remarkable popularizationof an extremely complex subject to say merely that we always knew that the tax system was unfair. Cynicism is not Johnson's issue. The tax code is not understood by ANY of officials we have elected and rely on to represent our interests,. It is a black hole that makes incalculable (literally) national wealth disappear from our common enterprise. While we argue about deficits or unfunded mandates, hundreds of billions of untaxed profits of the very rich are sheltered and deferred in ways unavailable to wage earners who will soon be further burdened by a perversion of the "alternative minimum tax." It is worth thousands of dollars to you, in all probability, to read this book carefully and then bring a copy to your Senators and Congressman with the demand that it be read. No vague review should divert every serious citizen from reading this clear and detailed explanation of why your government takes so much money from you while not securing your financial future.

This is one of the most amazing books about taxes I have ever read. Mr. Johnston proves, in convincing detail, how the US tax system has been hijacked by the super-rich. He does this in a wonderful prose and without ever resorting to exaggerations, just stating the embarrassing facts. If you ever wondered how so many executives can fly around to private vacations in corporate jets, this book will tell you why - the taxes they pay for this fringe benefit are less than they'd pay for the cheapest coach ticket, courtesy of the US Congress. There are dozens of other examples, such as this one. This is a book that will ruffle some powerful feathers that should have been dipped in tar a long time ago.

Written by David Cay Johnston I do not attack the Bush family in my book. In my book I explicitly state that it is perfectly proper for rich families to seek to tilt the tax system in their favor, that the problem is that the middle class has largely withdrawn from politics and the members of Congress -- many of whom, I have interviewed -- have their minds focused on the concerns of their donors, who are a narrow and rich group of Americans. That Congress behaves as it does fits perfectly with classic economic theory (I went to the Chicago graduate school of economics on a fellowship 31 years ago). I certainly say that the rich overall -- and they are not monolithic -- have changed our tax system and that the results we see today re not the result of normal capitalism, but a rigged market. But frankly I am just skimming here what commentators who have read the book, left and right and in the middle, have all been describing as -- and these are not my words, but theirs -- with terms like "extraordinary achievement," "One of the most important documents in the history of the Republic," "even handed," "the most extraordinary work of journalism I have ever read"..... Yesterday on the radio a leading lobbyist for the rich on taxes, who opened up on a radio interview with an attack, soon found himself saying again and again that he agreed with what I was saying....... So I hope you take the time to read the book, which is not an attack on the Bush family (and, indeed, makes no mention of any Bush other than the two presidents in their official role as President except for my examination of George W. Bush's income tax return to make a particular point about the tax system and the IRS).

Perfectly Legal by NYTimes Pulitzer Prize writer, David Cay Johnston, is the one book that all of us struggling to make ends meet cannot live without. In clear, indignant prose, Johnston writes about the political manipulations of our tax system so the superrich get richer and the poor get children--or jobs as checkers at Wal-Mart. Johnston shows how our tax system cheats most Americans out of their ability to save--or spend--while low taxes on investment incomes fill the pockets and swell the bankbooks of the super-rich to overflowing. Indicting both Republicans and Democrats, presidents and members of Congress, Johnston recommends tax reforms that will benefit the majority of Americans--not just the Super-Rich. Johnston's call to arms to the Everyday American is must reading. As Johnston writes, "It is by our actions, or inactions, that we create our own future. We can go on with what we have and pay a heavy price in lost opportunity. Or we can speak up one by one until we are heard. Ultimately, we can create a tax system actually promotes long-term prosperity." Placing the responsibility squarely on our shoulders, Johnston urges us, "Reform begins with you."Book Clubs owe it to themselves to adopt and discuss Perfectly Legal. And those of us who are lonely readers trying to figure out why we work so hard and have so little will find Perfectly Legal an investment in bettering our futures.