In his famous book The Big Short, Michael Lewis writes that “when, in 1981, [John Gutfreund] turned Salomon Brothers from a private partnership into Wall Street’s first public corporation . . . from that moment, the Wall Street firm became a black box”. Though Lewis was writing about banking, he was referring to a problem that existed not just at Salomon, or even just within the financial sector, but in nearly all American corporations, even public ones. In all too many areas, with the exception of basic financial information, corporations remain black boxes.
迈克尔•刘易斯(Michael Lewis)在其著名著作《大空头》(The Big Short)中写道：“1981年，约翰•古特弗罗因德(John Gutfreund)将所罗门兄弟(Salomon Brothers)从一家私人合伙公司变成第一家上市的华尔街公司……从那一刻起，这家华尔街公司就变成了一个黑匣子。”尽管刘易斯写的是银行业，但他指出的问题不仅仅存在于所罗门兄弟，甚至不仅仅存在于金融业，而是存在于几乎所有的美国公司，甚至是上市公司。除了基本的财务信息之外，在太多方面公司仍然是黑匣子。