If you could eliminate one person from history...who would it be?

[jmowreader]

392. Either Arthur Laffer or William Simon

Arthur Laffer invented the "cutting taxes increases government revenues" theory that Ronald Reagan used to push this country into the brink of collapse.

William Simon bought, with a partner, the Gibson Greetings greeting-card company using $1 million in cash, $330,000 of which came out of his own checking account. (The whole transaction cost $80 million, of which $79 million was borrowed money.) Eighteen months later, they sold Gibson Greetings back to the public in an IPO which netted the partnership $290 million. Simon, himself, came out of it $70 million richer. Leveraged buyouts had existed before but were largely initiated by company founders who were selling their firms before retirement. Simon proved you could do an LBO for (obscene!) profit, which caused firms like Kohlberg Kravis Roberts and Bain Capital to spring up. So, in short, if there was no William Simon, Mitt Romney would be running a Burger King in Detroit.