Journalist Bethany McLean On the Temperamental Toddler That Is the Stock Market

Vanity Fair contributing editor Bethany McLean is one of the world's most respected financial journalists. She has written for Slate and Fortune, where she published a 2001 article critical of the Wall Street darling Enron, helping to eventually expose the company as a fraud. She is the author of The Smartest Guys in the Room, also about the Enron scandal, All the Devils Are Here, about the 2008 financial crisis, and Saudi America, about fracking's impact on the U.S. economy. On this episode, she speaks with Jon about her upcoming book on the impact of Covid on the economy, how a background in math and a prior career as a Goldman Sachs analyst has made her a stronger journalist, and why investors are still putting their faith in CEOs with "big personalities" and a seeming knack for breaking things.