NOW with David Brancaccio. Politics & Economy. David Cay Johnston

2.13.04

David Cay Johnston

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Biography

NEW YORK TIMES Pulitzer prize-winning financial reporter David Cay Johnston has spent the past nine years exposing loopholes in the tax code. He reports that what Americans know about their tax system has nothing to do with the reality of it, and readily admits that for most of his 37 years of investigative reporting, he did not understand the tax system himself. David Brancaccio talks to Johnston about some of the surprising things revealed in his new book, PERFECTLY LEGAL: THE COVERT CAMPAIGN TO RIG OUR TAX SYSTEM TO BENEFIT THE SUPER-RICH, AND CHEAT EVERYBODY ELSE.

Journalist David Cay Johnston on NPR's Fresh Air

Biography

David Cay Johnston joined THE NEW YORK TIMES as a business financial reporter in February 1995. He covers taxes and the Internal Revenue Service. Mr. Johnston won a Pulitzer Prize for Beat Reporting in 2001 for his many thoughtful and revealing articles on how individuals and corporations cheat on their taxes.

Prior to joining THE TIMES, Mr. Johnston reported for THE PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER from 1988 to 1995. While there, he covered the casino industry. He also served as assistant business editor at the INQUIRER.

From 1976 to 1988, he served THE LOS ANGELES TIMES covering national news, Western states, cults, Mormons, the Los Angeles police department, charities, foundations, nonprofits, Hollywood, movies and television. From 1973 to 1976, Mr. Johnston was an investigative reporter at THE DETROIT FREE PRESS in Lansing, Michigan.

He began his journalism career at THE SAN JOSE MERCURY & NEWS in Santa Cruz, Monterey, Gilroy, Los Altos and Redwood City, California. He covered student radicals, land use and local governments from 1968 to 1973.

Born in San Francisco on December 24, 1948, Mr. Johnston studied economics and law at the University of Chicago in 1973. He also studied at Michigan State and San Francisco State University in 1972 and 1973 to 1975.