Council for Social and Economic Studies P.O. Box 34143 Washington, DC 20043
socecon@aol.com
Home Electronic Version
(Subscribers Only)
Prices / Subscribe
Recent Back Issues Sample Articles About JSPES

JSPES, Vol. 39, No. 1 (Spring 2014)
pp. 52 –59

BOOK REVIEW ARTICLE: One Man’s Fight for Stewardship and Professionalism: A Lesson in Business Ethics

Dwight D. Murphey

Wichita State University, retired

Exile on Wall Street: One Analyst’s Fight to Save the Big Banks from Themselves
Mike Mayo
John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2012

Mike Mayo’s personal account of his career as a bank analyst – during which he matched a professionalism that he learned while first working at the Washington, D.C. Federal Reserve against the desire of many among his employers to receive analyses that were less than objective – provides readers with an object lesson in integrity that deserves to be assigned reading in any MBA class on business ethics. In this article, we explore his reflections on the contemporary condition of American capitalism, and see how he joins so many others who have recently raised their voices against what they see as “crony capitalism.” The story of the gauntlet he has run on behalf of objectivity further allows us to examine in some detail the human mechanics that are involved as principled individuals seek to cope with, and sometimes confront, the “practical realists” who embrace an ethos of “going along to get along.”