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Online Store - Perfectly Legal: The Covert Campaign to Rig Our Tax System to Benefit the Super Rich - and Cheat Everybody Else
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List Price: $25.95
Our Price: $5.88
Your Save: $ 20.07 ( 77% )
Availability: N/A
Manufacturer: Portfolio Hardcover
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 336.200973
EAN: 9781591840190
ISBN: 1591840198
Label: Portfolio Hardcover
Manufacturer: Portfolio Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 352
Publication Date: 2003-12-29
Publisher: Portfolio Hardcover
Release Date: 2003-12-25
Studio: Portfolio Hardcover
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Editorial Reviews:
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One of the country's top investigative reporters reveals how the richest 1 percent of the country has rigged the tax code and other laws in its favor.
Since the mid-1970s, there has been a dramatic shift in America's socioeconomic system, one that has gone virtually unnoticed by the general public. Tax policies and their enforcement have become a disaster, and thanks to discreet lobbying by a segment of the top 1 percent, Washington is reluctant or unable to fix them. The corporate income tax, the estate tax, and the gift tax have been largely ignored by the media. But the cumulative results are remarkable: today someone who earns a yearly salary of $60,000 pays a larger percentage of his income in taxes than the four hundred richest Americans.
Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter David Cay Johnston exposes exactly how the middle class is being squeezed to create a widening wealth gap that threatens the stability of the country. By relating the compelling tales of real people across all areas of society, he reveals the truth behind:
* "middle class" tax cuts and exactly whom they benefit
* how workers are being cheated out of their retirement plans while disgraced CEOs walk away with millions
* how some corporations avoid paying any federal income tax
* how a law meant to prevent cheating by the top 2 percent of Americans no longer affects most of them, but has morphed into a stealth tax on single mothers making just $28,000
* why the working poor are seven times more likely to be audited by the IRS than everyone else
* how the IRS became so weak that even when it was handed complete banking records detailing massive cheating by 1,600 people, it prosecuted only 4 percent of them
Johnston has been breaking pieces of this story on the front page of The New York Times for seven years. With Perfectly Legal, he puts the whole shocking narrative together in a way that will stir up media attention and make readers angry about the state of our country.
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Subsidizing the Rich.
Comment: "Perfectly Legal" is the result of nine years of investigative research by the author. Some sources that he cites are tax lawyers, accountants, preparers, and tax protesters.
Mr. Johnson observes that "our tax system now forces most Americans to subsidize the lifestyles of the very rich, who enjoy the benefits of our democracy without paying their fair share of it's price."
There are examples of tax "engineers" that for a large fee will share schemes that allow tax evasion by exploiting a plethora of tax loopholes.
Of the many means employed to cheat on taxes, the deferral of compensation was an interesting and very common method. The battle over jet-travel perks was another expensive tax avoidance controversy.
The chapter "Big Payday" on executive's compensation was an eye-opener.
Is anyone worth some of these compensation packages? No! But that's corporate greed in it's most blatant form. The author demonstrates that greed is not owned solely by corporations and is often not easily detected. It is also rarely prosecuted.
Some more of the topics that struck me the most are:
The myth of the estate tax causing a loss of family farms. Most interesting is the the reason why the rich like Warren Buffett, George Soros, and Bill Gates, Sr. support the estate tax. Mr. Johnston states a disturbing fact- "Some of the biggest fortunes in America have never been taxed, not even once."
The hidden side-effects of the Alternative Minimum Tax or otherwise called the "Stealth Tax".
How tax evasion vehicles are promoted by tax advisers and large financial firms in an open fashion. Some of those advisers were former IRS employees. The 861 position was investigated.
The business philosophy employed by a few notorious CEOs which basically amounts to squeezing the pay and numbers of workers and then rewarding the executive on a ridiculous level.
How patriotism (remember the old logo "Made in America?) has taken a back seat while American corporations "expatriate" offshore.
The details of oil companies tax dodging schemes such as claiming profits in a foreign country and claiming expenses in the U.S.
The "moral hazard" of the limited liability partnerships(LLPs).
These partnerships limit the accountability of partners, removing potential incentive to monitor each other.
"What is in short supply in America is not capital, but income- at least for the half of Americans getting by on less than $28,000 per year- and educated minds. But our policy is aimed at more capital in the hands of the few, not at higher incomes for most so that they can acquire more assets..." Page 312-313.
"Transparency is good for the taxpayers overall, bad for the favored few." Page 315.
Those are a few of the astute observations made by the author.
If you only read one book the politics of taxes and the rich, I recommend reading "Perfectly Legal" by David Cay Johnston!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Excellent and disturbing
Comment: I read this book when it came to paperback a couple of years after its published date. I was so disturbed by some of the stories of freeloaders and tax cheats that I had to stop and google the offenders and to my surprise many of them are now behind bars for tax fraud!
No one likes paying taxes, but as a self-employed person I pay more than my fair share four times a year, and I am in the most likely group to be audited! So trust me I hate taxes as much as anyone.
But this book is really about the entire tax system and how it is broken and slanted for those with the very most. Mr. Johnston explains in detailed analysis going decades back into our tax codes, laws and rates and how over time the burden has been shifted from corporations and the extremely wealthy to ordinary working Americans. Johnston is also quite fair in blaming both political parties, and political leaders for their lack of tax understanding, tax laws and basic economic theory. The problems are on both sides of the fence, and we need to fix our system before things like the punishing Alternative Minimum Tax hit more and more middle income people.
Some other topics that Mr. Johnston brings up. How misguided political slashing of the IRS budget and staff has lead to an increase of audits of the poorest and the least able to fight back. And if you file for the Earned Income Tax credit, a credit for poor working parents, you are extremely likely to be audited. Meanwhile the extremely wealthy get by with huge tax scams costing the system billions.
Also a very quick read, Johnston has a way of writing complicated economic data simply. I read this in about 4 days. HIGHLY RECOMMEND.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Do you wanna know how little you matter to our government--enough to be audited because you aren't the super rich!
Comment: Read this book yesterday! This is important stuff and will piss you off on every page--get to it!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Easy but difficult read
Comment: I cannot offer enough enthusiasm in the written word to tell all Americans to read this book. It is easy and clear reading; but, I also add difficult because I could read only a few pages before having to take a breather. The book, by its revelations, so incenses me that I feel as though the top of my head will blow off.
How can we, as adult citizens, allow the wealthy and their hirelings to get away with screwing the general public so much? Johnston's book tells so much that it is almost too much. His next book, Free Lunch, is just as devastating to the wealthy. This country is going down the tubes and Johnston tells us most of the reasons why.
Customer Rating:
Summary: I dont have much to add
Comment: To some of the excellent reviews already published.
I just wanted to say READ THIS BOOK! The author does an enormous amount of personal research on the subject. Although it will outrage you, it will also enlighten you. I think this is one of the best books I have read in the last 10 years.
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