Each year, Fortune magazine publishes an article entitled, America's Most Admired Companies. It lists the 50 most

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Each year, Fortune magazine publishes an article entitled, "America's Most Admired Companies." It lists the 50 most admired companies in the United States and in the world. Fortune's rankings are based on scoring publicly held companies on what it calls nine key attributes of reputation: Ability to attract and retain talented people;

Quality of management;

Social responsibility to the community and the environment;

Innovativeness:

Quality of products or services; Wise use of corporate assets:

Financial soundness; Long-term investment value: and Effectiveness in doing business globally. In 2012, Fortune asked Hay Group to survey more than 15.000 people from multiple industries. Respondents were asked to choose the companies they admired most, regardless of industry. Fortune has been publishing this list since 1982. The 2012 Fortune list of the top 10 most admired U.S. companies were (starting with #1): Apple, Google, Amazon.com, Coca- Cola, IBM, FedEx, Berkshire Hathaway, Starbucks, Procter&Gamble, and Southwest Airlines.110 Eight years earlier in 2004, the list of 10 most admired U.S. companies was: Wal-Mart, Berkshire Hathaway, Southwest Airlines, General Electric, Dell Computer, Microsoft, Johnson&Johnson, Starbucks, FedEx, and IBM.

■ Why did the most admired U.S. firm in 2004 (Wal-Mart) drop off the 10 listing in 2012?

■ Why did Apple go from not even being on the 10 U.S. listing in 2004 to No. 1 in 2012?

■ Which firms appeared on both top 10 lists? Why?

■ Why did some firms drop off the list from 2004 to 2012 and why did others get included?

■ What companies should be on the most admired list this year? Why?

Go to the library and find a "Most Admired Companies" Fortune article from the 1980s or early 1990s and compare that list to the latest one. (See http://money.com tom/magazines/fortune/most-admired/2012/fulllist/ for the latest list.) Which companies have