Constructs a systemic explanation of the American financial market’s fin-de-siecle crash. Beginning with growing public faith in equities during the 1980s, Lowenstein portrays the rise of ‘shareholder value’ (i.e., stock prices) and excessive executive compensation as the most important paving stones. Both worked against ethical, long-term decision making. During the late 1990s, business standards also slipped in accounting, stock analysis, and law enforcement (as the government was overwhelmed and self-disarmed by the repeal of Glass-Stegall). Although dot-coms were everywhere evidencing bad deeds as well as misjudgment, the worst offenders were Enron, Worldcom, and Arthur Anderson. The author is marginally confident that Sarbanes-Oxley and other reforms will prevent recurrence: has the culture changed? (Probably not, human nature being persistent.) The indictment is compelling, but for the curious tenet that the market permissively allows ‘too many’ companies to compete in certain segments, such as air travel. Ultimately, he seems to lean toward centralism or worse.