A Wall Street Journal
Business Bestseller

  • "An account every citizen should read to understand how the national deficit affects our future."

    Bill Moyers

  • "Simon Johnson and James Kwak explain, with great lucidity and flair, how the battle lines on debt and taxes have been drawn going back to the founding fathers, and how things got off the rails in the last two decades."

    Daron Acemoglu
    Massachusetts Institute of Technology

  • "This is the kind of important, informed, and accessible book a democracy can’t do without."

    Noah Feldman
    Harvard Law School

  • "Simon Johnson and James Kwak cut through both the partisanship and the complexities of the debate over America’s national debt to give us a clear understanding of why it matters and what to do about it."

    Charles Ferguson
    Director, Inside Job

  • "A fascinating and lively history of how we got into this budgetary mess and a brilliant analysis, dispassionate and balanced, of what we need to do to get out of it."

    Liaquat Ahamed
    Author of Lords of Finance

  • "Simon Johnson and James Kwak have written a book that every American should read. Let's hope this book is a best seller."

    Senator Bill Bradley

  • "Their blueprint for resolving the budget problem without trampling on the basic needs of average Americans is must reading."

    C. Fred Bergston
    Director, Peterson Institute for International Economics

  • "Johnson and Kwak make a major and timely contribution to a national debate that will only get more heated in the years ahead."

    Mohamed A. El-Erian
    CEO, PIMCO

  • "The politicians don’t care about the economics. The economists don’t understand the politics. Johnson and Kwak get both, that’s why you should read this book.”

    James Robinson
    Harvard University

Excerpts

Reviews

Johnson and Kwak shot to prominence a couple of years ago after co-authoring 13 Bankers, a searing and readable account of the financial crisis, and their latest book is equally lucid—and alarming.

—Gillian Tett, Financial Times

An account every citizen should read to understand how the national deficit affects our future.

—Kevin G. Keane, San Francisco Chronicle

A thorough, scholarly account of how the country got into this predicament and how it can dig its way out.

—James Pressley, Bloomberg BusinessWeek

Johnson and Kwak bring dispassionate insights to bear on the bedeviling question of how to fix our fiscal mess before it gets fixed for us

—Steve Weinberg, USA Today

An excellent explication of how sheer ignorance of history (not to mention economics) can lead to policy prescriptions sure to lead to disaster

—Menzie Chinn, Econbrowser

Media

Wall Street Journal, March 23, 2012

The Leonard Lopate Show, WNYC, April 5, 2012

Fresh Air, WHYY, April 5, 2012

On Point, WBUR, April 11, 2012

Fox Business, April 5, 2012

MIT News, April 7, 2012

Marketplace, April 10, 2012

BBC News, April 10, 2012

Focus, Illinois Public Media, May 2, 2012

The Joy Cardin Show, Wisconsin Public Media, May 3, 2012