How is every last kid going into Investment Banking?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a parent, this mindset is a huge turn off. Look how many kids never had an interest in it, and are just following the Pied Piper. My friend's DD who just started at Columbia is staying up all night filling out finance club applications. She had zero interest before. My main concern is where are the kids who think independently and are not afraid to go against the tide? Who have a strong set of ethics and intellectual curiosity? This trend does not bode well, in addition to all the other messed up things going on right now.

My kid is at Dartmouth and everyone there is also filling out finance club apps. Our kid called last night and asked us "should I be doing this?" We said no!

The pressure is high at these schools. it feels like 90% of the kids are pursuing economics/finance.

At Dartmouth? They don’t even have a business degree.LOL Cornell and Wharton is where the Ivy business kids go.

Intelligent banks don't just hire undergrad business majors. They hire smart kids and train them themselves. I actually often preferred to stay away from the undergrad business majors. This mentality that you must major in "business" undergrad to work on Wall Street is completely incorrect.

This. Top banks hire Econ or math majors all the time. Wharton UG degree fwiw is a Bachelors of science in economics. not an undergrad "business" degree. Most UG "business" degrees ie BBA and similar are not well respected by the top places

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No it's all the smart, FGLI (first gen low income) kids on Reddit too. Take some time and read--they ALL want to go into investment banking.

The in vogue career path has turned from computer science to econ/banking in the first gen/immigrant crowd.

The reality is that few of these kids will make it as it's not a meritocracy.

Yep. That’s why they should just stick to going into medicine.

People don’t go into medicine because they couldn’t get a finance job. Money grubs have no business in medicine.

Agree. PP is an idiot.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No it's all the smart, FGLI (first gen low income) kids on Reddit too. Take some time and read--they ALL want to go into investment banking.

The in vogue career path has turned from computer science to econ/banking in the first gen/immigrant crowd.

The reality is that few of these kids will make it as it's not a meritocracy.

Yep. That’s why they should just stick to going into medicine.

People don’t go into medicine because they couldn’t get a finance job. Money grubs have no business in medicine.

Yeah dumb quote - and the money sucks for the amount of time required (my wife was a PGY-9). If that's your only concern, there are far better options elsewhere.

What are the far better options? 4 years of $60k per year followed by $600k per year seems pretty good to me.

more like 6-8 years and $300k unless you're in private practice procedural specialty. do NOT go into medicine for $$. these folks burn out quickly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a parent, this mindset is a huge turn off. Look how many kids never had an interest in it, and are just following the Pied Piper. My friend's DD who just started at Columbia is staying up all night filling out finance club applications. She had zero interest before. My main concern is where are the kids who think independently and are not afraid to go against the tide? Who have a strong set of ethics and intellectual curiosity? This trend does not bode well, in addition to all the other messed up things going on right now.

My kid is at Dartmouth and everyone there is also filling out finance club apps. Our kid called last night and asked us "should I be doing this?" We said no!

The pressure is high at these schools. it feels like 90% of the kids are pursuing economics/finance.

At Dartmouth? They don’t even have a business degree.LOL Cornell and Wharton is where the Ivy business kids go.

Intelligent banks don't just hire undergrad business majors. They hire smart kids and train them themselves. I actually often preferred to stay away from the undergrad business majors. This mentality that you must major in "business" undergrad to work on Wall Street is completely incorrect.

This. Top banks hire Econ or math majors all the time. Wharton UG degree fwiw is a Bachelors of science in economics. not an undergrad "business" degree. Most UG "business" degrees ie BBA and similar are not well respected by the top places

The reason they are not "well respected" is just school-based name prestige and alumni connections. The schools that have high SAT/high GMAT kids and lots of rich kids are "well respected".

I was an economics major (considered a BBA but loved my liberal arts electives too much) and I have a top MBA.

People like to b.s. about how dumbed down a BBA curriculum is...but really it's all about the quality of student. Between business classes and humanities classes, I've had equally deep in-class intellectual experiences.

As the quality of b-school students at solid schools has increased, so has the depth of the education.

A lot of old prejudices trace back to the days when rich white college grad men were pretty much guaranteed a job regardless of what they studied in college. And hereditary money was cooler than self-made money.

[Anonymous]

I know zero teens with interest in this. My son is interested in engineering and working as an engineer, his friends are interested in architecture, law, or entering the military after college as an officer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There's endless chatter on the front end, as these kids discuss their interest in IB, share tips and info, and otherwise chase these jobs.

Some land them. Most don't. I would love to hear from that second group of kids (or their parents) about what they do instead, after the endlessly-discussed IB plan falls through.

Just had this convo with my college senior last night. Most of his friends are business. He is IR and has no desire for finance-type jobs. The kids with the IB dreams as freshman (when they barely knew what that meant) started broadening their scope to PE (ew) then now as seniors moving to wealth management when the first 2 haven't worked out. The kids who actually get the IB or other "most prestigious by name only" jobs are nepo hires.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are many levels of investment banking. I worked in real estate investing banking. I was a poor Asian immigrant. Lots of unhooked kids get into finance from a top school. I went to Harvard. I knew tons of unhooked kids from Harvard, MIT, Cornell, Columbia, Penn, NYU, etc. I don’t remember nepo kids. The people I knew were all qualified. Of course some of those qualified people had parents who were up there but that is not why someone was hired.

We did have interns and entry level kids who were nepo kids as I became more senior.

Looking back, would you recommend your experience? What do you think you would have done instead if that offer hadn't come through?

I ended up marrying a very smart and driven guy. He makes $$$ and I’m now a SAHM.

I don’t think I was in a hyper competitive environment. I interviewed well. I’m attractive. I had a very high rate of getting interviews and offers. I am naturally smart so I didn’t necessarily have to try that hard.

I saw someone prior post that their kid is studying 10+ hours per day for interviews. I spent an hour before the interview and almost always got an offer.

[Anonymous]

Pp again. I remember something called an airplane test. I was a likable, confident and always smart. The most important was that I truly was passionate about what I wanted to do. I’m not sure you can study to do this.

My husband is extremely successful and super likable and trustworthy. This has worked out well for him. He makes everything look easy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As a parent, this mindset is a huge turn off. Look how many kids never had an interest in it, and are just following the Pied Piper. My friend's DD who just started at Columbia is staying up all night filling out finance club applications. She had zero interest before. My main concern is where are the kids who think independently and are not afraid to go against the tide? Who have a strong set of ethics and intellectual curiosity? This trend does not bode well, in addition to all the other messed up things going on right now.

My sister and several of her classmates at Wharton joined the marines in the officer program. The military likes to recruit smart kids from the Ivys.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Pp again. I remember something called an airplane test. I was a likable, confident and always smart. The most important was that I truly was passionate about what I wanted to do. I’m not sure you can study to do this.

My husband is extremely successful and super likable and trustworthy. This has worked out well for him. He makes everything look easy.

Airport test. "Would you want to be stuck with this person in an airport during a layover".

Wall Street and Consulting both look for attractiveness and articulate presentation because they are often selling services. I received this feedback during consulting internship interviews. Consulting is about selling a process. Not getting to the right answer in the quickest way possible.

It's like how Donald Trump likes to brag about his appointees looking out of "Central Casting". Like Hegseth.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There's endless chatter on the front end, as these kids discuss their interest in IB, share tips and info, and otherwise chase these jobs.

Some land them. Most don't. I would love to hear from that second group of kids (or their parents) about what they do instead, after the endlessly-discussed IB plan falls through.

Just had this convo with my college senior last night. Most of his friends are business. He is IR and has no desire for finance-type jobs. The kids with the IB dreams as freshman (when they barely knew what that meant) started broadening their scope to PE (ew) then now as seniors moving to wealth management when the first 2 haven't worked out. The kids who actually get the IB or other "most prestigious by name only" jobs are nepo hires.

Thanks. This is helpful. What's your son hoping to do with his IR major next year? DC is looking at IR, as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As a parent, this mindset is a huge turn off. Look how many kids never had an interest in it, and are just following the Pied Piper. My friend's DD who just started at Columbia is staying up all night filling out finance club applications. She had zero interest before. My main concern is where are the kids who think independently and are not afraid to go against the tide? Who have a strong set of ethics and intellectual curiosity? This trend does not bode well, in addition to all the other messed up things going on right now.

I'm interested in this, as well. Especially kids at T25 schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Pp again. I remember something called an airplane test. I was a likable, confident and always smart. The most important was that I truly was passionate about what I wanted to do. I’m not sure you can study to do this.

My husband is extremely successful and super likable and trustworthy. This has worked out well for him. He makes everything look easy.

I guess humble isn’t part of the airport test.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are many levels of investment banking. I worked in real estate investing banking. I was a poor Asian immigrant. Lots of unhooked kids get into finance from a top school. I went to Harvard. I knew tons of unhooked kids from Harvard, MIT, Cornell, Columbia, Penn, NYU, etc. I don’t remember nepo kids. The people I knew were all qualified. Of course some of those qualified people had parents who were up there but that is not why someone was hired.

We did have interns and entry level kids who were nepo kids as I became more senior.

Looking back, would you recommend your experience? What do you think you would have done instead if that offer hadn't come through?

I ended up marrying a very smart and driven guy. He makes $$$ and I’m now a SAHM.

I don’t think I was in a hyper competitive environment. I interviewed well. I’m attractive. I had a very high rate of getting interviews and offers. I am naturally smart so I didn’t necessarily have to try that hard.

I saw someone prior post that their kid is studying 10+ hours per day for interviews. I spent an hour before the interview and almost always got an offer.

So if you woke up with a couple of zits on the morning of the interview and was bloated from a night of partying do you think you would still interview well knowing your attractiveness had dropped down quite a few points? You might not have interviewed that well thinking the interviewer was staring at your flaws?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a parent, this mindset is a huge turn off. Look how many kids never had an interest in it, and are just following the Pied Piper. My friend's DD who just started at Columbia is staying up all night filling out finance club applications. She had zero interest before. My main concern is where are the kids who think independently and are not afraid to go against the tide? Who have a strong set of ethics and intellectual curiosity? This trend does not bode well, in addition to all the other messed up things going on right now.

My kid is at Dartmouth and everyone there is also filling out finance club apps. Our kid called last night and asked us "should I be doing this?" We said no!

The pressure is high at these schools. it feels like 90% of the kids are pursuing economics/finance.

At Dartmouth? They don’t even have a business degree.LOL Cornell and Wharton is where the Ivy business kids go.

Somewhere, a Tuck MBA is wincing.

It used to be uncool to have undergrad business degrees (except for Penn). Business degrees were for the relatively less smart kids. Cornell added undergrad business fairly recently compared with the age of their MBA program.

Econ is the traditional Ivy substitute and is not really much more intellectual or pro-social. Undergrad business includes lots of economics, psychology, statistics, etc.

Princeton kids major in Econ as a signaling tool. Michael Lewis wrote how college econ is useless for the actual work. An Econ degree is a "sifting device" for recruiters to identify like-minded drones willing to endure a boring course of study, thereby signaling their abject commitment to Wall Street servitude.