Abstract
While I was reading this book, I regularly broke out laughing. My wife asked, “What are you reading?” I told her the title and content. Her response was “You’re sick,” a reply with which, as an economist, I am familiar. I then read some selected passages to her, and she (she’s not an economist) also laughed. Our laughter is evidence of the delightful style of this book, which is written in a popular, nonacademic, even folksy, style. Here are some titles of sections: “Alice in Fiscal Land,” “Playing Against Our Kids,” “Figures Lie and Liars Figure.” Yet its content and warning to us is very serious, as indicated by the title. After you read this book, you may agree with my wife, in spite of her acquiescence in mirth, because its contents are not a laughing matter.
