Michael Lewis | Celebrity Net Worth 2026

Early Life and Education

Michael Lewis was born on October 15, 1960, in New Orleans, Louisiana. He is the son of community activist Diana and corporate attorney J. Thomas. Lewis attended the K-12 nondenominational Isidore Newman School in New Orleans. One of his classmates was Sean Tuohy, who would later be the subject of Lewis' book "The Blind Side" along with his future wife, Leigh Anne Tuohy. Sean's father was the school's basketball coach, and today the gymnasium is called the Tuohy Gymnasium.

After high school, Michael attended Princeton University, from which he graduated cum laude with a degree in art history in 1982. Realizing that he would have trouble finding lucrative work as an art historian, Lewis decided to change tracks and enrolled at the London School of Economics as a graduate student. He graduated from the school in 1985 with his master's degree.

Salomon Brothers

Primary Income Streams & Multi-Million Contracts

After graduating from the London School of Economics, Lewis was hired by the New York-based investment bank Salomon Brothers. His starting salary of $48,000 was equal to roughly $90,000 in today's money. Michael later returned to London to work at the company's office there, where he served as a bond salesman for a few years.

Books

From his experience at Salomon Brothers, Lewis was inspired to pen his first book, "Liar's Poker." Published in 1989, it both recounts his time at Salomon and explores the evolution of the mortgage-backed bond. Michael next wrote "Pacific Rift," which came out in 1991. That title was followed by "The Money Culture" and "Trail Fever." Lewis closed out the '90s with "The New New Thing," about entrepreneur James H. Clark and the booming Silicon Valley culture he helped foster. Kicking off the new millennium, Michael published "Next: The Future Just Happened," which considers the potential groundbreaking social effects of emergent technologies. L

Lewis followed that with one of his most acclaimed books, "Moneyball." Centered on the Oakland Athletics baseball team and its general manager, Billy Beane, the book explores the team's sabermetric approach to putting together its player roster. "Moneyball" was adapted into an Oscar-nominated film in 2011, written by Aaron Sorkin and Steven Zaillian, directed by Bennett Miller, and starring Brad Pitt as Beane.

Real Estate, Luxury Assets & Personal Investments

Michael continued writing about sports. In 2006, he released "The Blind Side," which told the story of his childhood friend Sean Tuohy's adoption of Michael Oher, who would grow up to be an NFL star. It became his second title to be adapted into a film, this one by writer-director John Lee Hancock. The 2009 film adaptation starred Sandra Bullock in an Oscar-winning performance.

Lewis released two books in 2009: "Home Game: An Accidental Guide to Fatherhood" and "Panic: The Story of Modern Financial Insanity." The following year, he published "The Big Short," which chronicles the build-up to the financial crisis of the late 2000s and the players who ended up profiting from it. The book was his third to be adapted into a film, with Adam McKay directing, McKay and Charles Randolph writing the script, and Christian Bale, Brad Pitt, Ryan Gosling, and Steve Carell starring. Michael's other major books have included "Flash Boys," about the financial phenomenon of high-frequency trading; "The Undoing Project," about the close academic partnership between Israeli psychologists Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman; "The Fifth Risk," which explores the unpreparedness of the Trump administration in assuming governmental roles; and "The Premonition," focused on the COVID-19 pandemic.

T.J. Kirkpatrick/Getty Images

Other Writing

Beyond his books, Lewis has written for numerous publications, including the Spectator, the New York Times Magazine, the New Republic, Bloomberg, and Slate. In 2009, he became a contributing editor to Vanity Fair, where he has penned an array of buzzy pieces over the years. Michael also wrote and narrated a short non-fiction story called "The Coming Storm" for Amazon's Audible series of audiobooks.

Podcasting

In the spring of 2019, Lewis launched his own podcast, "Against the Rules." Produced by Pushkin Industries, the podcast addresses different aspects of society in regard to questions of fairness, looking at everything from consumer finance to art authentication.

Personal Life

Michael married his first wife, Diane de Cordova, in 1985. His second wife was investment banker and journalist Kate Bohner, whom he wed in 1994. After their divorce, Lewis married photographer and former news reporter Tabitha Soren in 1997. The couple had three children together, and lives in Berkeley, California. In May 2021, their daughter Dixie was killed in a car crash.

Lewis

Soren