Fwd: Chicago Tribune notice on “Cheap Motels and a Hot Plate: An Economist’s Travelogue”
[I interviewed Michael about the book; it’s at http://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/Radio.html#070322.]
Chicago Tribune - July 8, 2007 http://www.chicagotribune.com/travel/chi-0708resourcefuljul08,1,7005601.story
The Resourceful Traveler By June Sawyers
“Cheap Motels and a Hot Plate: An Economist’s Travelogue” (Monthly Review Press, $15.95)
It isn’t often that you come across a travel guide whose main theme
is inequality. But, then again, it isn’t too often that travel guides
are written by economists. Thus, author Michael D. Yates visits some
of the most beautiful spots in the United States—Estes Park, Colo.;
Jackson, Wyo.; Moab, Utah—but with a different perspective in mind.
His book is a commentary on work and inequality, race and class in
both small towns and big cities. In 2001, Yates took early retirement
from his teaching position and, along with his wife, moved around the
country on what became a five-year journey, working at Yellowstone
one summer as a hotel desk clerk, before moving to Manhattan, then on
to Miami Beach, Portland, Ore., and then embarking on a four-month
road trip that took them to California, Arizona, New Mexico,
Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, Washington and back to
Oregon. On their road trips, they stayed at cheap motels and cooked
their own meals on a hot plate (hence the title). Another theme is
what Yates calls the destruction of the natural world. “Two of the
most noticeable features of the American landscape,” he writes, “are
its growing uniformity and our disregard for beauty. With few
exceptions, one small or medium-sized town could be substituted for
another: highways leading into and out of town clogged with traffic
and crawling with strip malls, the same fast-food restaurants and
stores everywhere.” This is an endlessly fascinating and provocative
book—certainly a unique one—that is passionate and often quite angry.
You will learn things here that you didn’t know and probably don’t
want to know, as Yates, filtered through his own experiences,
describes a country of paupers and millionaires living side by side
and yet complete strangers to one another. A veritable eye opener.
(ISBN: 978-1-58367-143-6)