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A Nation Of Takers: America�s Entitlement Epidemic (2012)

by Nicholas Eberstadt(Favorite Author)

3.83 of 5 Votes: 3

ISBN

1599474352 (ISBN13: 9781599474359)

languge

English

genre

Nonfiction

publisher

Templeton Press

review 1: Using US government data, Nicholas Eberstadt documents the unending rise of welfare spending or "government transfers to individuals." He goes beyond the obviously unsound Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid programs and documents spread of people on disability insurance despite the improvements in health care over the last 50 years. All told, nearly 48% of American households receive government transfers from at least one program. He covers some other areas including the steady exit of males from the workforce and the relative unchanged level of poverty in the US since LBJ declared his war on poverty, despite the ballooning of government entitlement programs.Towards the end, he demonstrates that government transfers are choking out the nation's ability to provide for ... morenational defense. He also makes plain the absurdity of recent sequestration measures, largely focused on DOD spending, proposed by Obama to significantly affect the nation's debt, much like chucking pebbles into a rushing river to stop a flood.At the end are a couple alternate interpretations of the facts, which lend more credence to the book and engender further reflection. While I think Mr Eberstadt upon occasion oversells his conclusions, the facts speak loudly themselves and plainly call for drastic changes.
review 2: The data in this book confirms what most of us already know -- things are broken with the entitlement programs in USA. I enjoyed the factual approach that Eberstadt takes that is devoid of the political rhetoric (this isn't a republican or a deomocrat issue) that conversations on entitlements are usually smothered in.The most disturbing section of the book is when the author points out that we are placing all of these burdens on the backs of unborn Americans (i.e. my children). Another disturbing trend is the fact that these programs are abused by those who fish around for a corrupt doctor who will confirm they are disabled so that they can live a life of mediocrity that is passed on to future generations. That creates massive issues within American culture and work ethic.This book is great / bad in the sense that there is no sulition presented. The lack of resolution allows the reader to think more deeply about potential solutions, but more proposed improvements to the current system would have been nice. less

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