Bailout: An Inside Account of How Washington Abandoned Main Street While Rescuing Wall Street

In this riveting account of the mishandling of the TARP bailout fund, a former federal prosecutor offers behind-the-scenes proof of the corrupt ways Washington officials serve the interests of Wall Street.

In this bracing, page-turning account of his stranger-than-fiction baptism into the corrupted ways of Washington, Neil Barofsky offers an irrefutable insider indictment of the mishandling of the $700 billion TARP bailout fund. During the height of the financial crisis in 2008, Barofsky gave up his job in the esteemed US Attorney’s Office in New York City to become the special inspector general overseeing the spending of the bailout money. But from day one his efforts to protect against fraud and to hold the big banks accountable were met with outright hostility from Treasury officials. Bailout is a riveting account of Barofsky’s plunge into the political meat grinder of Washington, and a vital revelation of just how captured by Wall Street our political system is and why the banks have only become bigger and more dangerous in the wake of the crisis.

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Non-Fiction Social science Political science Government

Editorial reviews (1 review)

The New York Times : Bad Banks, Big Bailouts and Bruises (July 24, 2012)

Mr. Barofsky, now a senior fellow at New York University School of Law, does a good job of describing the complex financial products at the core of the crisis. And he does open windows into how Washington works, though not always those he intended.