The show ran for 32 years, reaching its ratings peak in the mid-1980s. By the 1990s, it faced increasing competition from rivals such as CNBC before Rukeyser left in 2002 after a dispute with network executives who wanted to replace him with younger hosts (he was 69 at the time) with the idea that this would spark ratings. MPT executives offered him a five-minute segment on the new, retooled show; Rukeyser declined. In his final episode, which was broadcast live, he deplored the decision of Maryland Public Television's management and urged viewers to write their PBS stations and clamor for the new financial program he would soon create. Maryland Public Television fired him immediately after the broadcast and erased the master tape; the only existing copies of the broadcast possibly exist at other PBS stations, in home copies or on YouTube under the title "Louis Rukeyser's Swan Song Part 1&2".