After the high-profile scandals involving first Ebbers and now Madoff, I have to think that the name “Bernard” has seen its last birth certificate for some time.
It’s not as if the name – which was in the “Top 100” at the turn of the century – was exactly flourishing before 2002, when the first hints of the WorldCom scandal became known. According to Social Security name data, the name “Bernard” was already in a slow, steady decline through the 1990s, dropping from the 430th most popular boy’s name in 1990, to 496th in 1995, and to 654th in 2000.
