For more than four decades, Canadian nationalist, publisher and best-selling author, Mel Hurtig, has been warning Canadians about the negative influences of the excessive corporate takeover of Canada, including the impacts of foreign ownership and so-called free-trade agreements. In this short but important book, Mel Hurtig turns his attention to the devastating impact that the Stephen Harper government has had on Canada, radically altering the democratic, social and economic fabric of the country. He shows how Stephen Harper's single-minded pursuit of big oil and the tar sands, at a time when the world must take dramatic action to arrest climate change, has inflicted enormous damage on our country and on our international reputation. He contends that Harper rose to power with an agenda so contrary to Canadian principles and values, that the only way he could pursue it was through a takeover of Canadian democracy. Mel Hurtig is the legendary Edmonton bookseller, publisher and creator of The Canadian Encyclopedia who became a political activist, then an author in 1991 with his huge bestseller The Betrayal of Canada. He is also the author of Pay the Rent or Feed the Kids, The Vanishing Country, Rushing to Armageddon and The Truth About Canada. He is an Officer of the Order of Canada, and has received many honorary degrees and other honours. He lives in Vancouver.

Canadian politicians have, from time to time, proclaimed a war against poverty. What they are really prosecuting, however, is a war against the poor. Unemployment benefits are routinely denied to people who, over the course of a lifetime, have contributed a portion of their earnings to UI (now called EI). Welfare rolls have been slashed by provincial governments. The downloading of government services combined with tax cuts that benefit the rich have resulted in the reduction or elimination of countless programs, from hot lunches in the schools to subsidized housing. Politicians and bureaucrats have responded by inventing new definitions of poverty but people without food remain just as hungry as before and people without shelter are still without homes. At no time since the Great Depression has the gap between rich and poor been so wide and the outlook for poor people been so grim. Hard-hitting and outspoken, Hurtig builds a compelling portrait of Canadian society under the rule of the "neo-Neanderthals." He puts together the latest and most reliable statistics with stories told by people on the front lines of the poverty wars. Many of these stories are as heart-rending as the comments from politicians and their corporate supporters are callous. Pay the Rent or Feed the Kids challenges all Canadians to re-examine the society we are living in and to demand changes for the better.