num_pages: 288
description: New York Times bestelling author T. R. Reid travels around the world to solve the urgent problem of America's failing tax code unravelling a complex topic in plain English - and telling a rollicking story along the way. The U.S. tax code is a total write-off. Crammed with loopholes and special interest provisions it works for no one except tax lawyers accountants and huge corporations. Not for the first time we have reached a breaking point. That happened in 1922 and again in 1954 and again in 1986. In other words every thirty-two years. Which means that the next complete overhaul is due in 2018. But what should be in this new tax code? Can we make the U.S. tax system simpler fairer and more efficient? Yes yes and yes. Can we cut tax rates and still bring in more revenue? Yes. Other rich countries from Estonia to New Zealand to the UKadvanced high-tech free-market democracieshave all devised tax regimes that are equitable effective and easy on the taxpayer. But the United States has languished. So byzantine are the current statutes that by our governments own estimates Americans spend six billion hours and $10 billion every year preparing and filing their taxes. In the Netherlands that task takes a mere fifteen minutes! Successful American companies like Apple Caterpillar and Google effectively pay no tax at all in some instances because of loopholes that allow them to move profits offshore. Indeed the dysfunctional tax system has become a major cause of economic inequality. In A Fine Mess T. R. Reid crisscrosses the globe in search of the exact solutions to these urgent problems. With an uncanny knack for making a complex subject not just accessible but gripping he investigates what makes good taxation (no thats not an oxymoron) and brings that knowledge home where it is needed most. Never talking down or reflexively siding with either wing of politics T. R. Reid presses the case for sensible root-and-branch reforms with a companionable ebullience. This affects everyone. Doing our taxes will never be America's favorite pastime but it can and should be so much easier and fairer.
language: English
title: A Fine Mess: A Global Quest for a Simpler, Fairer, and More Efficient Tax System
publisher: Penguin Press