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Arnold Rothstein's importance, in the view of Biographer Katcher, is that he was a pioneer of modern crime. "He took the various elements that were needed to change crime from petty larceny into big business and fused them. The end result was a machine that runs smoothly today." Younger men—Capone, Luciano, Costello —made more money than Rothstein and ruled larger empires, but they owed the managerial revolution to their predecessor, the man whom Ernest Cuneo. La Guardia's biographer, described as "one of the most verminous characters ever to infest New York City."