Good Guys and Bad Guys

A fascinating collection of profiles by one of America’s leading business journalists. For three decades, in major publications such as Texas Monthly, Esquire, Fortune, and now The New York Times, Joe Nocera has reported on the people who dominate the business world, for better or worse. Everyone from Warren Buffett to T. Boone Pickens to George Steinbrenner to Ken Lay has fallen under his microscope. Now, in this collection of his best work, he explores how we define good guys and bad guys in business and concludes that things are often not what they seem. It turns out that there are surprisingly good qualities in classic villains like junk bond king Michael Milken and notorious stock analyst Henry Blodget. And some business celebrities who are widely admired, such as Steve Jobs, are not quite the good guys they appear to be on the surface. Good Guys and Bad Guys also offers a fresh perspective on some of today’s biggest controversies, such as global warming, Apple’s iPhone, CEO compensation, the tobacco industry, short sellers, and much more.