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Wednesday, April 28th 4:45-5:30 pm
University Events Room
Glickman Family Library, 7th floor
Portland USM Campus (map)

Imagine an America where the economy grows in ways that make 90 percent of the people worse off while nearly all of the gains go to the top one tenth of one percent. That is exactly what the official data show has happened over the last three decades. To neoclassical economists the widening gap between the super rich and everyone else is good because any gain is an improvement. But under the classical school of economics, created by Adam Smith and others, policies that benefit the majority are good. This is the story of how classical economics favors wealth creating activities, while neoclassical economics treats wealth destruction as a good and how we could stimulate our economy through a program of government-sanctioned murders for hire.
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David Cay Johnston is the best-selling author and Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter who was called the "de facto chief tax enforcement officer of the United States" after he exposed many hundreds of billions of dollars worth of sham tax shelters and tax crimes. The Washington Monthly calls him "one of America's most important journalists" and the Portland Oregonian said his work is the equal of the pioneer muckrakers Upton Sinclair, Ida Tarbell and Lincoln Steffens.

Johnston is the author of the bestsellers FREE LUNCH, about hidden subsidies to the rich, and PERFECTLY LEGAL, an expose of how the tax system benefits the rich that won the 2004 Investigative Book of the Year award. 

His next book, THE FINE PRINT, about legalized price gouging, will be out later this year from Portfolio Books.

Johnston teaches the tax and business law of the ancient world at Syracuse University College of Law and Whitman School of Management and is a columnist for Tax Notes magazine.

He also does commentaries for NPR and created a public radio essay series, "How Did We Get Here," about how ancient world insights shaped our economy today. 

From 1968 to 2008, Johnston was an investigative business reporter for The New York Times and four other major newspapers.

The colloquium is sponsored by the
L.L. Bean/Lee Surace Endowed Chair in Accounting.
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USM Professor Jeffrey Gramlich was appointed the first L.L. Bean/Lee Surace Chair in Accounting in the USM School of Business in 2003. His appointment was made possible by a $1 million gift from L.L. Bean, Inc., its board chair, Leon Gorman, his wife Lisa, Jim and Maureen Gorman, and Tom Gorman, who established the chair in memory of L.L. Bean CFO Lee Surace '73, '81, who died in March of 2001. Surace was chair of the USM School of Business' Advisory Council and was a frequent guest lecturer.

The USM School of Business is accredited by the prestigious AACSB International. For students seeking the finest education and companies seeking the highest caliber talent, partnership, and educational opportunities, AACSB International accreditation is one of the most important affirmations of sustained quality in the word. For more information about School of Business programs, call 780-4020.

M President