Reddit reviews The American Way of Death Revisited

Have you read The American Way Of Death? First published in 1963 but still so relevant, if not more so now since the death industry has gotten ever more savvy and predatory.

Profits of Death and to a lesser extent Mary Roach's Stiff also do a good job puncturing that shitty industry.

What we practice in the US now, embalming with airtight caskets (they have “burping coffins” like Tupperware to release gas) began during the Civil War because of the hideous condition the bodies would often arrive home in after so long. If you’re down with learning about all the different things having to with the funeral industry and as well as how industry professionals have either lobbied to make some absurd practices legal requirements or will try to convince you they are when they’re not then these are fascinating to read, Jessica Mitford’s The American Way Of Death and Mary Roach’s Stiff: The Curious Lives Of Human Cadavers. Some of the most interesting reading you’ll ever do to be sure.

"The American Way of Death" by Jessica Mitford is a great treatment of the growth of the funeral industry in the US. A few decades old, but still enlightening. Link here: http://www.amazon.com/The-American-Way-Death-Revisited/dp/0679771867

There is no blanket rule that covers every person in an industry for sure, but there are plenty of documented instances in which the funeral industry has used their unique market to pressure and strong sell people on very inflated services and items at their weekest and most easily guilted time. Quite often outright lying to customers (like telling people that they have to embalm their loved ones even if they are going to be cremated) and violating FTC regulations in the process.

There were numerous reports of funeral homes charging for services they never rendered or marking up to ridiculous levels equipment and items.

While the normal markup on caskets is more in the range of 400-500% some were found to be as much as 10X markup. And often the funeral homes would make it as difficult as possible to find out about the cheapest options they are required to offer.

It's been a while since I was looking into it but I believe Jessica Mitford's book The American Way of Death Revisited discusses quite a bit of this.

http://www.amazon.com/The-American-Way-Death-Revisited/dp/product-description/0679771867

Monks are all over beer.

But I mostly came here to recommend people read The American Way of Death Revisited which is a good overview of how badly the funeral industry gouges people- and we buy into it at almost every turn, believing that somehow these gaudy funerals matter to a corpse.

https://www.amazon.com/American-Way-Death-Revisited/dp/0679771867

From one of the Mitford sisters. Old, but not much has changed.

My suggestion is to read book-length journalism by top-tier journalists. Below are some examples. Also, you should check out the Longform podcast, which has interviews with journalists about their careers and their work.

David Carr - The Night of the Gun
David Remnick - Reporting: Writings from the New Yorker
Jennifer Gonnerman - Life on the Outside: The Prison Odyssey of Elaine Bartlett
Ta-Nehisi Coates - The Beautiful Struggle: A Father, Two Sons, and an Unlikely Road to Manhood
Jessica Mitford - The American Way of Death Revisited
Wendy Ruderman & Barbara Laker - Busted: A Tale of Corruption in the City of Brotherly Love
Michael Herr - Dispatches

Is the bulk of "The American Way of Death" still relevant today? http://www.amazon.com/The-American-Way-Death-Revisited/dp/0679771867

How much of the industry is upselling? Is it possible to have a cheap funeral?

http://www.amazon.com/The-American-Way-Death-Revisited/dp/0679771867/

Shocked that, in the first 100 comments, no one seems to have suggested the amazing non-fiction eye-opener about the U.S. funeral industry: The American Way of Death, by Jessica Mitford.

This book was a cult classic, handed from college-generation to college-generation for at least 30 years. It is still a great read, and the latest revised version is as pithy and apropos as ever: http://www.amazon.com/American-Way-Death-Revisited/dp/0679771867