Who benefits from government subsidies?

On the next Your Call, we'll have a conversation about subsidies. Oil production is one of the most heavily subsidized businesses in America. The tax breaks average about 4 billion dollars a year. Meanwhile, ten percent of America's largest farms receive almost three-fourths of federal farm subsidies. So how do subsidies affect the economy? Join us live at 11 or send us an email at feedback@yourcallradio.org. Why do subsidies matter? It's Your Call, with Rose Aguilar and you.

Guests:

Timothy Wise, director of the Research and Policy Program at the Global Development and Environment Institute at Tufts University.

Steve Kretzmann, executive director of Oil Change International!

Robert Weismann, president of Public Citizen.

Click to Listen: Who benefits from government subsidies?

Your Call 022508 The Big Rip-Off

How are America's richest being subsidized by the rest of us? On the next Your Call we welcome back the New York Times' Pulitzer Prize winning investigative reporter, David Cay Johnston. Johnston's beat is the inscrutable world of the federal tax system and his new book is called Free Lunch: How the Wealthiest Americans Enrich Themselves at Government Expense (and Stick You With The Bill). How do the wealthiest Americans direct subsidies and rig markets in their favor and what can we do about it? It's Your Call with Rose Aguilar and you.

Guest:
David Cay Johnston in Rochester
Pulitzer Prize winning New York Times investigative reporter has spent his 40-year career exposing collusion between government officials and private interests as they enrich the rich and beggar the poor. His new book is just out in stores and is called Free Lunch: How the Wealthiest Americans Enrich Themselves at Government Expense (and Stick You With The Bill).

Click to Listen: The Big Rip-Off