Nicholas R. Parrillo is associate professor of law at Yale University.
"Economists beware! In this path-breaking book, Nicholas Parrillo
revolutionizes our understanding of compensation systems. With
gripping historical evidence, he demonstrates the profoundly
political and cultural construction of the US’s salary system." -
Viviana A. Zelizer, author of Economic Lives: How Culture Shapes
the Economy (Princeton University Press, 2010)
*Viviana Zelizer*
"Against the Profit Motive is more than a prodigiously researched
account of public employee compensation in the United States.
It offers a foundational perspective on one of the most challenging
dilemmas Americans faced over three centuries: empowering
government officials to act independently on behalf of the public
good while ensuring the legitimacy of those actions, even when they
met with opposition." - Brian Balogh, author of A Government Out of
Sight: The Mystery of National Authority in Nineteenth-Century
America (Cambridge University Press)
*Brian Balogh*
"Nicholas Parrillo's Against the Profit Motive represents the best
in a new generation of source-based, reality-based legal history.
Forgoing yet another discussion of the usual cases and
well-worn theory and historiography, Parrillo takes us somewhere
new. Through exemplary and tireless research in previously untapped
primary sources, Parrillo takes us deep into the inner workings of
early American governance and meticulously reconstructs a
previously unknown historical world of public-private bounties,
fees, rewards, prizes, gifts, profits, and moieties that made that
all-important machinery seem to "go of itself." Together with
his Yale colleague Jerry Mashaw, Parrillo is doing nothing less
than rewriting the history of the early American state."--William
Novak, University of Michigan Law School
*William Novak*
Winner of the 2014 Law and Society Association James Willard Hurst
Book Prize.
*Law and Society Association*
“A fascinating and deeply researched book [that] explores what must
be among the least examined aspects of American history — the way
compensation for public officials has changed over time. Today’s
mega-state would never have been possible without the changes in
compensation [Parrillo] documents.”—George Leef, Forbes
*Forbes*
“This is a remarkable book. Based on prodigious research and
artfully reported, Against the Profit Motive recounts an untold
story with important implications for political and theoretical
issues . . . . An impressive achievement that will make a lasting
contribution to our understanding of the development of the modern
state.”—Logan Everett Sawyer III, Journal of Economic History
*Journal of Economic History*
“A fascinating new study of the salary revolution in American
government . . . . Parrillo makes a persuasive argument about the
importance of an often little-noticed aspect of American government
. . . . Highly recommended.”—Choice
*Choice*
“Parrillo expertly explains how and why state and federal
governments moved from paying their employees and contractors fees
to paying them salaries . . . . Rewarding reading.”—Michael Ariens,
Federal Lawyer
*The Federal Lawyer*
Winner of the 2014 Annual Scholarship Award from the American Bar
Association's Section on Administrative Law
*American Bar Association*
“The theories and history Parrillo documents form the perfect
background for tackling the radical changes taking place in
policing and teaching in recent decades . . . . [His] book is a
deep and engrossing dive into the history of the provisioning of
government services during the first 160 years of our country. . .
. [A] major scholarly achievement.”—Boston Review
*The Boston Review*
“This is an important book that makes an original contribution to
our understanding of the formation and power of the American state.
It belongs on the bookshelf of every scholar of American political
development and public administration.”—Peri E. Arnold, Review of
Politics
*The Review of Politics*
“[P]owerful and provocative . . . [This book] is a work of history,
but this history has immense contemporary relevance . . . Parrillo
transports us to the largely forgotten world of nineteenth-century
American government as bazaar. This was a world in which one could
readily mistake citizens for consumers – and bureaucrats for
businessmen . . . [A] sweeping and vivid account.”—Harvard Law
Review
*Harvard Law Review*
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