Tracie mcmillan biography of christopher

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The point of the book is not just to interpret the “white bonus” but to end it.”

“Intimate and eye-opening...

At MacDowell, worked on her second book, The White Bonus, which combines literary reportage, investigative journalism, and memoir to measure the cash value of being white in America.

A one time target of Rush Limbaugh, McMillan also oversees national coverage of worker organizing for Capital & Main.

Tracie has received fellowships from the Russell Sage Foundation, MacDowell, and the Knight-Wallace Journalism Fellows at the University of Michigan. A partial scholarship at New York University yielded a well-connected nannying gig; a B.A.

in Political Science; and a reporting apprenticeship with investigative reporter Wayne Barrett at the Village Voice. Her essays and journalism have been published in the New York Times, Mother Jones, Harper’s, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, National Geographic, and elsewhere. McMillan has the writing skills to bear witness, the research background to provide context, and the courage to take on the challenging task.”

A rural Midwestern transplant to New York City, Tracie McMillan is the author of The White Bonus: Five Families and the Cash Value of Racism in America (Henry Holt + Company, 2024) and the New York Times bestseller,The American Way of Eating  (Scribner, 2012), which won the Books for a Better Life Award and the Hillman Prize for Book Journalism.

Her career began with an internship under the legendary investigative reporter at the Village Voice, Wayne Barrett. She has spoken widely about her work and the topics it covers for audiences ranging from the Logan Symposium on Investigative Reporting to the Chautauqua Institution, Seattle Town Hall to Texas A&M University.

Previously, Tracie served as a Senior Fellow at the Schuster Institute for Investigative Journalism; the managing editor at City Limits magazine in New York City; and as a member of the James Beard Foundation Media Awards Journalism Committee, where she pushed for broader racial, economic, and geographic diversity in judging panels.

Born and raised in the exurbs between Flint and Detroit, she currently splits her time between Brooklyn, NY and Detroit, MI.

 

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Tracie McMillan

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The White Bonus: Five Families and the Cash Value of Racism in America

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The American Way of Eating: Undercover at Walmart, Applebee's, Farm Fields and the Dinner Table

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Tracie McMillan

Tracie McMillan is the author of The American Way of Eating: Undercover at Walmart, Applebee’s, Farm Fields and the Dinner Table, a New York Times bestseller and winner of the Sidney Hillman Book Prize.

Armed with an ethnographer’s sensitivity, a journalist’s instinct, a scholar’s capacity to see the value of both forests and trees, and a poet’s gift for turning words into feelings, she combines deep investigative research with personal stories to reveal that “whiteness” is America’s most lucrative fiction, the intangible asset that keeps on giving—and taking.

Her essays and journalism have been published in the New York Times, Mother Jones, Harper’s, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, National Geographic, and elsewhere. She is a two-time finalist for a Casey Medal for Meritorious Journalism, a Livingston Award Finalist, and the winner of the Harry Chapin Media Award, the James Aronson Prize for Social Justice Journalism, and a James Beard Foundation Journalism Award.

The book traces the history of her working-to-middle class Michigan family for three generations, tracking how white supremacy in public policy influenced their material progress. She grew up on a dirt road and started working at 14, at an orchard, to save for college. A onetime target of Rush Limbaugh, McMillan oversees coverage of worker organizing for Capital & Main.

Tracie has received fellowships from the Russell Sage Foundation, MacDowell, and the Knight-Wallace Journalism Fellows at the University of Michigan.

And we didn't give that to Black communities and other communities.”

Tracie was a scholarship kid at New York University, where she received her B.A. in Political Science. She splits her time between Detroit and Brooklyn.

Portrait byRoman Cho

In 2023, she joined the award-winning news site, Capital & Main.

The daughter of a lawnmower salesman and an English major, Tracie has supported herself since the age of 19.

A 2013 Knight-Wallace Fellow at the University of Michigan, McMillan has written for publications including National Geographic, the New York Times, and Harper’s, and in 2014 she was the Koeppel Journalism Fellow at Wesleyan University. In 2023, she began editing coverage of worker organizing at the award-winning news site, Capital & Main.

In an interview with NPR, Tracie was asked what she says to  people who believe that there’s discrimination against white people: “I'd say for a long time, we've had affirmative action for white people, particularly when you look at the 20th century, right?

Blending investigative and undercover reporting with intimate storytelling, McMillan’s work has been acclaimed by institutions ranging from the James Beard Foundation, Books for a Better Life, and the International Association of Culinary Professionals to the James Aronson Award for Social Justice Journalism, the Sidney Hillman Foundation and Investigative Reporters and Editors.

So when you look at the postwar period, which is, you know, for my family, where most of our wealth comes from, the GI Bill, which essentially was designed to go to white folks - I mean, it was not written that way, but it was implemented that way, it was understood by everybody that that's the way it was going to play out, and then you could get help with your mortgage and things like that.

She is a two-time finalist for a Casey Medal for Meritorious Journalism, a Livingston Award Finalist, and the winner of the Harry Chapin Media Award, the James Aronson Prize for Social Justice Journalism, and a James Beard Foundation Journalism Award. She is a former Knight-Wallace Fellow at the University of Michigan, a one-time target of Rush Limbaugh, and has published journalism in The New York Times, Washington Post, Harper’s, Food & Wine, Mother Jones, and National Geographic.

She currently serves as a senior fellow at the Schuster Institute for Investigative Journalism at Brandeis University.