What's the appeal of working on Wall Street?

[Anonymous]

A metric shit ton of money?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Judging by this board, that seems to be a goal of many. I grew up in the South and never heard of anyone aspiring to work on Wall Street, so I have to wonder what the big deal is with it. Yes, I assume the money is good, but aren't the hours horrific? And when people say "work on Wall Street" is that just a euphemism for going into finance or do people literally mean work on Wall Street? That would entail living in Manhattan, which certainly appeals to some, but would be considered dreadful to many others.

My response is a quote from Step Brothers, the best movie ever made: "I want to make BANK, bro. I want to get ASS. I want to drive a Range Rover." That's about it, at least these days.

My parents worked on Wall Street in the 60s, met at work, got married secretly (it was against company policy) and commuted from Scarsdale every day until I came along. My mother wore a hat and gloves to work every day.

In the past, it was a nice stable work environment. I've no idea why anyone would want to work there today, except for money. Plenty of people still commute to Wall Street from Westchester every single day.

They commuted from Arizona?

That's Scottsdale, Einstein. Scarsdale is in Westchesrer County, NY.

I am PP to whom you are responding, and yes, Westchester, not Arizona.

[Anonymous]

Private equity associate here who left IB last year (I was at an elite boutique, but did my summer internships at two bulge bracket banks). For me, the appeal of Wall Street was quite simple:

1) I was genuinely interested in finance and investing in college. I read investing books for fun and really enjoyed going to my finance classes. Getting to use what I was passionate about in college on the job appealed to me as I was setting my sights on graduation and the world beyond.
2) I wanted to live in New York immediately after graduation, giving me lots of options if my first-choice employer didn't work out.
3) The money didn't hurt, of course. The hours, while not appealing, were brutal (I was at a sweatshop, even amongst the banking set) but I'd be lying if I said that I didn't learn a ton about time management, bull-shitting, working around office politics with some extremely strong personalities in play, and valuing companies/using Excel. I've used all of those skills successfully in pro-bono efforts, among other, non-work settings.

In the end, I got 5 years of work experience out of 2 years in banking. The hours were tough, the work could get mundane (as is the case at any entry-level job, really) but banking was a good place to sit and think about what I wanted to do going forward. If nothing else, the skills I gained are valued, at present, in the job market, and are easily transferrable elsewhere should I decide to get out of finance entirely. I can't say the same for other entry-level career paths.

I hope some of that was useful. Happy to talk further about the job, both pluses and minuses.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why are people in here acting like making money isn't a desirable goal? FYI if you said something like that, you MIGHT want to check your privilege. The only people who say money doesn't matter are people who grew up with it and can't imagine life any other way.

These days, most highly educated professionals are expected to work AT LEAST 50 hours a week but usually more. I don't know about you, but if I'm going to spend 10 hours a day at work no matter what, I'd rather make the 500k + (extremely hefty bonus) salary rather than the 50-250k salary.

It is, but I left. Money was great, but I got NO fulfillment from it. Now, had I done it at 22, that may have been different. I ended up in IB with a law degree b/c the bankers were struggling with the docs. Long story. I stayed 4 years b/c it is a young person's game. By the time I went to structured finance, I was married with 2 kids. I got no fulfillment from it.

Member of bar? What did you move to?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I started out my career at Morgan Stanley in the late 1980's with a group of 55 other analysts. All of the analysts in my class were extremely strong college students from competitive colleges (The Ivies, MIT, Stanford, Northwestern as well as many from SLACs and the most selective state schools, like UVA / UMichigan / Cal), and most were leaders on their college campuses in some capacity. They were rarely from gilded backgrounds: Harvard hockey captain from a farm near Calgary, biochemist lacrosse player from Syracuse. Here is what this group is doing 30 years later:

2 are presidents of non-profits
10 are CEOs or CFOs of companies
5 are retired entrepreneurs
10 are in private equity or venture capital
5 are wealthy hedge fund managers
3 or 4 are in government - Treasury, Department of Energy, White House
A bunch are lawyers, from corporate to public interest
Several are teachers
A bunch are happy stay-at-home parents
Only a handful are still investment bankers

The intensity and rigor of IB provides great training for many, many future professions. And if you can make a few bucks and pay off your student debt while you are growing into who you want to be, no harm.

I can't believe you keep up with your analyst class this closely. I'm 20 plus years younger than you are and I maybe know what two people are up to.

We have reunions. I forgot to mention that the professional network has been invaluable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why are people in here acting like making money isn't a desirable goal? FYI if you said something like that, you MIGHT want to check your privilege. The only people who say money doesn't matter are people who grew up with it and can't imagine life any other way.

These days, most highly educated professionals are expected to work AT LEAST 50 hours a week but usually more. I don't know about you, but if I'm going to spend 10 hours a day at work no matter what, I'd rather make the 500k + (extremely hefty bonus) salary rather than the 50-250k salary.

It is, but I left. Money was great, but I got NO fulfillment from it. Now, had I done it at 22, that may have been different. I ended up in IB with a law degree b/c the bankers were struggling with the docs. Long story. I stayed 4 years b/c it is a young person's game. By the time I went to structured finance, I was married with 2 kids. I got no fulfillment from it.

You are so out of touch. It is a privilege to think about fulfillment. Many people grind away at worse jobs and aren't paid enough to support their families.

Yes, because your options are to work monster hours making $500K/year or grind away at a job that doesn't support your family If you are smart enough to work on Wall Street, you are smart enough to find another less stressful/more fulfilling job if that's what you want.

Where do you people GET this stuff?

Are you purposely dense? Yes, you can get other jobs. That's exactly what people do after their 2-year stint is over. But there aren't really that many entry-level jobs that allow you to pay off $60,000 while also sending money home because your parents need your support too.

Oh please. The vast majority of college grads heading to Wall Street come from well-to-do families. They don't have college loans and they sure as hell aren't supporting their parents.

Flat wrong. Supporting families immediately after college, maybe not. But majority well-to-do, hardly. Smart and aggressive are the most common traits. Sales and trading groups typically look for the hungry and not the entitled types.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Money. A friend moved with family to make $500k a year plus bonus. Plan to make that much for 5 years and then go elsewhere.

That's not that great of a plan, especially with family.

First off it takes around 500k to support a family in Manhattan and send two kids to private school. A two bedroom apartment (kids sharing a room) will be around 5-6k a month. Private school for two kids is 100k a year. Income taxes are extremely high. Buying into a decent coop requires at least 50 percent down and a year of majntenance and mortgage payments in the bank.

In terms of the bonus, bonuses vest over time and only a portion is in cash. So if your friend leaves at year five then he or she will be leaving a lot of money on the table and that will include some of what he or she earned in years 2-5. Most firms vest over a period of three years.

Also then what is this person going to do? It's hard to match a Wall Street salary except maybe out in Silicon Valley. After you're making close to a million a year it's hard to give that up and people are going to find it strange if you are applying for 200k jobs in flyover country. In fact they won't interview you as they will assume something is wrong.

THis is us - we moved west to work in high tech after being DoD contractors. HHI is near $2M. It's hard to leave. THe golden handcuffs are tight.

[Anonymous]

I went into nursing after college so I have no idea what a typical work day would be like on Wall Street. What exactly do you do those 70 hours a week when working on Wall Street.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I started out my career at Morgan Stanley in the late 1980's with a group of 55 other analysts. All of the analysts in my class were extremely strong college students from competitive colleges (The Ivies, MIT, Stanford, Northwestern as well as many from SLACs and the most selective state schools, like UVA / UMichigan / Cal), and most were leaders on their college campuses in some capacity. They were rarely from gilded backgrounds: Harvard hockey captain from a farm near Calgary, biochemist lacrosse player from Syracuse. Here is what this group is doing 30 years later:

2 are presidents of non-profits
10 are CEOs or CFOs of companies
5 are retired entrepreneurs
10 are in private equity or venture capital
5 are wealthy hedge fund managers
3 or 4 are in government - Treasury, Department of Energy, White House
A bunch are lawyers, from corporate to public interest
Several are teachers
A bunch are happy stay-at-home parents
Only a handful are still investment bankers

The intensity and rigor of IB provides great training for many, many future professions. And if you can make a few bucks and pay off your student debt while you are growing into who you want to be, no harm.

I can't believe you keep up with your analyst class this closely. I'm 20 plus years younger than you are and I maybe know what two people are up to.

We have reunions. I forgot to mention that the professional network has been invaluable.

Clearly. I feel like so many from my analyst class are also doing well. However no one has any desire to keep up with each other. I'm surprised your class is so active.

[Anonymous]

You'd be surprised at the number of WS "bankers" from top undergrad schools who spend their days proofing powerpoints and playing glorified travel agent to arrange corporate road shows and investor conferences.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I went into nursing after college so I have no idea what a typical work day would be like on Wall Street. What exactly do you do those 70 hours a week when working on Wall Street.

I'm 19:27 and can answer that. Between 9:00 a.m. and ~3:00 p.m., the VPs and Managing Directors are in client meetings, so Analysts like me would have a lot of downtime. You had to be at work in case there was a firedrill, and by the time a "normal" workday ended, VPs and MDs would get back to the Analysts and Associates with edits on our work that they wanted done "by tomorrow morning." So you'd stay late to finish it. Then the printer would invariably jam or the copy room would consider your pitch book a low priority, so you'd spend some time trying to convince them otherwise. Then, you go home tired, rinse and repeat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The most successful guy I know is the CEO of a Fortune 500 company. Makes tens of millions a year.

Both of his kids went to Ivies and now work for bulge bracket investment banks in NYC. I'm assuming this guy knows a thing or two and steered his kids into this profession for very good reasons.

what's your point? that wall street douches breed wall street douches?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I started out my career at Morgan Stanley in the late 1980's with a group of 55 other analysts. All of the analysts in my class were extremely strong college students from competitive colleges (The Ivies, MIT, Stanford, Northwestern as well as many from SLACs and the most selective state schools, like UVA / UMichigan / Cal), and most were leaders on their college campuses in some capacity. They were rarely from gilded backgrounds: Harvard hockey captain from a farm near Calgary, biochemist lacrosse player from Syracuse. Here is what this group is doing 30 years later:

2 are presidents of non-profits
10 are CEOs or CFOs of companies
5 are retired entrepreneurs
10 are in private equity or venture capital
5 are wealthy hedge fund managers
3 or 4 are in government - Treasury, Department of Energy, White House
A bunch are lawyers, from corporate to public interest
Several are teachers
A bunch are happy stay-at-home parents
Only a handful are still investment bankers

The intensity and rigor of IB provides great training for many, many future professions. And if you can make a few bucks and pay off your student debt while you are growing into who you want to be, no harm.

I can't believe you keep up with your analyst class this closely. I'm 20 plus years younger than you are and I maybe know what two people are up to.

We have reunions. I forgot to mention that the professional network has been invaluable.

Princeton? Reunions there are a little off the hook...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I started out my career at Morgan Stanley in the late 1980's with a group of 55 other analysts. All of the analysts in my class were extremely strong college students from competitive colleges (The Ivies, MIT, Stanford, Northwestern as well as many from SLACs and the most selective state schools, like UVA / UMichigan / Cal), and most were leaders on their college campuses in some capacity. They were rarely from gilded backgrounds: Harvard hockey captain from a farm near Calgary, biochemist lacrosse player from Syracuse. Here is what this group is doing 30 years later:

2 are presidents of non-profits
10 are CEOs or CFOs of companies
5 are retired entrepreneurs
10 are in private equity or venture capital
5 are wealthy hedge fund managers
3 or 4 are in government - Treasury, Department of Energy, White House
A bunch are lawyers, from corporate to public interest
Several are teachers
A bunch are happy stay-at-home parents
Only a handful are still investment bankers

The intensity and rigor of IB provides great training for many, many future professions. And if you can make a few bucks and pay off your student debt while you are growing into who you want to be, no harm.

I can't believe you keep up with your analyst class this closely. I'm 20 plus years younger than you are and I maybe know what two people are up to.

We have reunions. I forgot to mention that the professional network has been invaluable.

Princeton? Reunions there are a little off the hook...

Huh?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why are people in here acting like making money isn't a desirable goal? FYI if you said something like that, you MIGHT want to check your privilege. The only people who say money doesn't matter are people who grew up with it and can't imagine life any other way.

These days, most highly educated professionals are expected to work AT LEAST 50 hours a week but usually more. I don't know about you, but if I'm going to spend 10 hours a day at work no matter what, I'd rather make the 500k + (extremely hefty bonus) salary rather than the 50-250k salary.

It is, but I left. Money was great, but I got NO fulfillment from it. Now, had I done it at 22, that may have been different. I ended up in IB with a law degree b/c the bankers were struggling with the docs. Long story. I stayed 4 years b/c it is a young person's game. By the time I went to structured finance, I was married with 2 kids. I got no fulfillment from it.

You are so out of touch. It is a privilege to think about fulfillment. Many people grind away at worse jobs and aren't paid enough to support their families.

Yes, because your options are to work monster hours making $500K/year or grind away at a job that doesn't support your family If you are smart enough to work on Wall Street, you are smart enough to find another less stressful/more fulfilling job if that's what you want.

Where do you people GET this stuff?

Are you purposely dense? Yes, you can get other jobs. That's exactly what people do after their 2-year stint is over. But there aren't really that many entry-level jobs that allow you to pay off $60,000 while also sending money home because your parents need your support too.

Oh please. The vast majority of college grads heading to Wall Street come from well-to-do families. They don't have college loans and they sure as hell aren't supporting their parents.

Flat wrong. Supporting families immediately after college, maybe not. But majority well-to-do, hardly. Smart and aggressive are the most common traits. Sales and trading groups typically look for the hungry and not the entitled types.

Uh huh. Sure.