Family and Banking

Living in New York is easy to come in contact with bankers. Three nights ago I went out to dinner with a friend who brought a friend who used to work at Merrill Lynch before getting take over by BofA. We got into the whole banking conversation and went on to tell me the hours were not 100 a week but were more like 8:00am-10:00pm in real estate and lodging with an occasional all nighter. He looked at me and said "You better say good bye to your family and friends boo boo because in banking you are selling your soul to the devil". As his story went on he then proceeded to tell a story of how one day he looked out the window, then looked at his co-workers, who then looked at him and asked if he was ok. He went back to his cubicle to clean his desk and said his good byes to everyone. Now he manages a restaurant and pulls 200k after bonus and gets to see his family and friends when he wants.

On the other hand, my mentor who underwrites debt for F500s and does buybacks. He has 20yrs experience on the street and is a BSD. Over steak dinner, 2 weeks ago we touched on the same topic. He has 2 kids and a gorgeous wife but never sees them; they live in short hills NJ. Most of the time he stays at the penthouse he owns in a building in midtown. He goes home on the weekends because he tells me work is more important than family and if it wasn't for work he wouldn't have a family. He also told me that by working in Wall street you are selling your soul to satan due to the hours. But in the end work provides so it's more important.

Is there two kinds of people on Wall street? Is there a happy medium? Would you rather be middle high class with family and friends or a cold heart BSD who never gets to see his family?

Will you mind being this guy??

 

I think the "best" answer to say is spending time with your family above all, but honestly I just want to cash in the big bucks and sleep with 10000 women. Why have a wife when you can have 10000 chicks?

 
chubbybunny:
I think the "best" answer to say is spending time with your family above all, but honestly I just want to cash in the big bucks and sleep with 10000 women. Why have a wife when you can have 10000 chicks?

Please don't tell me you think being an MD will yield you 10000 women.

 
WallStreetKid:
chubbybunny:
I think the "best" answer to say is spending time with your family above all, but honestly I just want to cash in the big bucks and sleep with 10000 women. Why have a wife when you can have 10000 chicks?

Please don't tell me you think being an MD will yield you 10000 women.

I like the "yielding" comment

 
chubbybunny:
I think the "best" answer to say is spending time with your family above all, but honestly I just want to cash in the big bucks and sleep with 10000 women. Why have a wife when you can have 10000 chicks?

Just out of curiosity, do you actually know any guys in finance that do this? I'm reminded of Uncle Eddie's boy Back-Door Mark again. In fact, I know a guy who reminds me a lot of him. Dude's kind of a dead beat careerwise, but he slays like you wouldn't believe (both in terms of quality and quantity). As far as I can tell, in order to accomplish that, you need to be so focused on slaying chicks, that it doesn't leave much time/energy for other stuff.

 
econ:
chubbybunny:
I think the "best" answer to say is spending time with your family above all, but honestly I just want to cash in the big bucks and sleep with 10000 women. Why have a wife when you can have 10000 chicks?

Just out of curiosity, do you actually know any guys in finance that do this? I'm reminded of Uncle Eddie's boy Back-Door Mark again. In fact, I know a guy who reminds me a lot of him. Dude's kind of a dead beat careerwise, but he slays like you wouldn't believe (both in terms of quality and quantity). As far as I can tell, in order to accomplish that, you need to be so focused on slaying chicks, that it doesn't leave much time/energy for other stuff.

Most of my coworkers have no game whatsoever. I am in a somewhat quantitatively focused area, so it may be somewhat atypical, but you could take these guys to mardi gras and I think they would have a hard time getting a girl to flash them.

Then again, I just realized that all but two have long term girlfriends, maybe they were pretty good back in the day but just hung it up. The gf's I met are all high quality too. Good balance of hot/intelligent. No dumbass trophy wives anywhere.

 
econ:
chubbybunny:
I think the "best" answer to say is spending time with your family above all, but honestly I just want to cash in the big bucks and sleep with 10000 women. Why have a wife when you can have 10000 chicks?

Just out of curiosity, do you actually know any guys in finance that do this? I'm reminded of Uncle Eddie's boy Back-Door Mark again. In fact, I know a guy who reminds me a lot of him. Dude's kind of a dead beat careerwise, but he slays like you wouldn't believe (both in terms of quality and quantity). As far as I can tell, in order to accomplish that, you need to be so focused on slaying chicks, that it doesn't leave much time/energy for other stuff.

This is so true. Pretty much all single IB and PE guys I know are desperate to get lucky, including myself.

 
chubbybunny:
I think the "best" answer to say is spending time with your family above all, but honestly I just want to cash in the big bucks and sleep with 10000 women. Why have a wife when you can have 10000 chicks?

So wrong. You won't have time for the chicks and you will get tired of the hoes.

When you start looking for a real companion it will be too hard and too late

Worst, if you sink into the culture you will not be capable of actually having a normal relationship because you'll treat every decent girl like a hoe.j

In the end of the life, you will really regret your actions.

The 2nd guy in the original post, does have a point that the job provides him with many things, but one should be able to adjust/change the job to actually enjoy the family a little.

Do what you want not what you can!
 

I'd be happy as the restaurant manager pulling in 200K, but then again I'm a foodie making 6 figures on top of that is icing on the cake.

"Do whatever it takes to keep the legend of Wall Street as it was truly intended live on. When you think back on investment banking of the early 21st century, remember the heat—remember the passion. But mostly, remember the titans. " - LSO
 
Best Response

I know a lot of people disagree with me, but I think the best way to handle a career on Wall Street is to treat it like a smash-and-grab job on a pawn shop: get in, make your money, and then get the fuck out before they even knew you were there.

This obviously is directed more toward traders than bankers. Traders at least have an opportunity to make a pile of dough and then bolt. Bankers are kinda stuck.

 
Edmundo Braverman:
I know a lot of people disagree with me, but I think the best way to handle a career on Wall Street is to treat it like a smash-and-grab job on a pawn shop: get in, make your money, and then get the fuck out before they even knew you were there.

This obviously is directed more toward traders than bankers. Traders at least have an opportunity to make a pile of dough and then bolt. Bankers are kinda stuck.

Best possible answer hands down

Thats what I am in it for, because I realize I don't want to be like my MD(who is afemale), and be pushing 40, no kids, no social life ( but she claims to have one), having no real 'friends' aka people who hang out with you not for the person you are but for the person they use as a medium to meet people through.

I know it sounds like sobby reasoning or logic, but you have to step back and realize whats important to you and what you want down the road, WHO KNOWS my view might change and I might turn into the female MD pushing 40 with no kids, but I see as very unlikely since sex opps are just to expensive :P

-Whooooo kiddddddd

- Only time will tell....
 
barboon:
Living in New York is easy to come in contact with bankers. Three nights ago I went out to dinner with a friend who brought a friend who used to work at Merrill Lynch before getting take over by BofA. We got into the whole banking conversation and went on to tell me the hours were not 100 a week but were more like 8:00am-10:00pm in real estate and lodging with an occasional all nighter. He looked at me and said "You better say good bye to your family and friends boo boo because in banking you are selling your soul to the devil". As his story went on he then proceeded to tell a story of how one day he looked out the window, then looked at his co-workers, who then looked at him and asked if he was ok. He went back to his cubicle to clean his desk and said his good byes to everyone. Now he manages a restaurant and pulls 200k after bonus and gets to see his family and friends when he wants.

On the other hand, my mentor who underwrites debt for F500s and does buybacks. He has 20yrs experience on the street and is a BSD. Over steak dinner, 2 weeks ago we touched on the same topic. He has 2 kids and a gorgeous wife but never sees them; they live in short hills NJ. Most of the time he stays at the penthouse he owns in a building in midtown. He goes home on the weekends because he tells me work is more important than family and if it wasn't for work he wouldn't have a family. He also told me that by working in Wall street you are selling your soul to satan due to the hours. But in the end work provides so it's more important.

Is there two kinds of people on Wall street? Is there a happy medium? Would you rather be middle high class with family and friends or a cold heart BSD who never gets to see his family?

Will you mind being this guy??

http://www.youtube.com/embed/iYOop4Minzo?rel=0

It's entirely possible to have both. I know plenty of bankers who, after paying their dues, enjoy a balanced schedule.
 

" Most of the time he stays at the penthouse he owns in a building in midtown"

Have you even lived in NYC? I pull in 200k all in from investments + salary right now and I consider myself poor in NYC. 200k is absolute crap and so is real estate ibd.

If you can't handle 1 year of IBD (2nd year is a freaking joke, just waiting to leave now to buyside) then you can't ever handle a 4 year institution like MIT, Caltech, UChicago, etc.

How come no one complains at those colleges? Because they are actually elite and hard working and intelligent unlike the few losers who slip by the cracks and get into IBD who just complain all day because they can't handle playing WoW all day vs. actually working

 

I agree with the above about market making. I used to be in that game, and it was the happiest I have ever been. I wasn't making huge amounts of money, but I was comfortable, and I was almost always home by 7. Working on the prop side is a fairly happy medium, though it seems the pay has stagnated there for the past 10 years. My friends that were in the 150-300 range around 2000, are still in that range. Not a small chunk of change, but that was "rich" in 2000, and I would only put that at "wealthy" now.

 

I you want to have a relaxed life during the first years of your IB experience, you are not thinking straight, or IB is simply not for you. You will probably not find enough time for your family and social life until you get to MD level. After that, you will relax a lot more and not feel like a corporate slave.

 

I don't mind slaving away in IBD for a couple years if that means an improved lifestyle in PE afterwards. I'm under the impression/illusion that PE offers increased (or at least equal) pay with less hours (50-70 hrs/wk) and increased ability to make concrete plans on weekends and such. If that's true, I think a couple years of hard work would be worth it. I'd rather have a life than try to make a mil a year by the time I'm 30.

 
barboon:
Is there two kinds of people on Wall street? Is there a happy medium? Would you rather be middle high class with family and friends or a cold heart BSD who never gets to see his family?

I think it just comes down to personal preferences really. I totally understand why some want to be BSDs, even at the expense of everything else. Personally, I'm hoping for some balance, so the 80+ hours a week are not gonna work for the lifestyle I'm trying to obtain (and thus, getting to BSD income will be damn near impossible). Guess I'd rather be middle high class with a lot of other stuff going on in my life.

 

The only bankers that are "slaying" (I hate that term) chicks every weekend are guys that have the game to do that regardless of whether or not they're in banking. If you're throwing money around every weekend without any game you're not going to get laid by different chicks every weekend -- you're just going to end up attracting dumb, annoying gold-diggers that you'll have to actually date to get any action, and that you'll hate actually spend any time with other than when you're having sex.

More importantly, the idea of going after Wilt Chamberlain's 10,000 women record is one of those things that sounds a lot more enticing when you're not hooking up regularly than when you are. I don't know about all of you guys, but whenever I've hit a hot streak, the law of diminishing marginal returns comes into play... Each incremental hook-up becomes decidedly less enjoyable, and the morning-after escape/get-the-f-out-of-my-place dynamic becomes harder to tolerate.

As for the comments about reducing your workload to "50-70 hrs/wk" as you progress in your career, I think a lot of people fail to do the math on what that means and how little time you get with your family even at those reduced levels. If you're working 60 hours per week with no weekend work, that essentially means you're working from 8am to either 8:30pm or 9pm Monday through Thursday and 8am to 5pm on Friday. After accounting for commuting, that leaves you virtually no time to spend with your kids during the week, especially if you have any young kids.

 

So being a BSD isn't everything anymore? I thought this site would choose money over family. Good to know Thanks for the responses I was thinkings about selling my soul to the devil but I guess that won't happen anymore.

"The higher up the mountain, the more treacherous the path" -Frank Underwood
 

A close mentor did manage to have an extremely impressive career and simultaneously had a big impact on his kids' life.

He managed a large PE fund for a major financial institution, but made a point to coach every single one of his kids' sports teams / be the family that hosted all the school parties / serve on the PTA board / etc. I talked to him about how he managed to do this, and he said while he was climbing the ranks, he almost got fired a few times for leaving work so often. But after a few years, his coworkers began to respect him for being so strong in his values. He is one of the most personable people I've ever met, and I'm sure that his personality / network saved his job multiple times over.

He did mention one secret to working in finance and raising a family -- NOT living in New York. He said that NYC promotes this insane way of life that favors extremes over balance, while other places (especially in the south) are much more accommodating.

 

The price for success.

Try to study some of the great people of this world. PTJ, Buffet, Gates, Jobs, whatever you consider a great person. Even high ranking politicians. Family or the Career.

Atleast untill youre satisfied with your place in the hiarchy. Very successfull people have no real friends remember that.

- Your Future Worldly Renowned Investor
 
workerbee:
most bankers dont have game, problem is they use banking as a cruch which after the 3rd time becomes overused by everyone whos remotely in banking. By the 4th time, most girls heard it and are over it.
That's true of every job tough. That's why men buy patek's and ferraris. Anyone can tell you hes rich, gotta back it up. That said ideally you wouldn't need conspicious consumption to get chicks.

I have come up with a pretty good description of the problem that everyone faces. Life is like the trilemma of macroeconomics.

You can only have two of the following: Safety, Money, Freetime.

An entrepreneur can get rich working few hours and have lots of freetime(which will be likely used for family), but he has no safety.

An investment banker has relative job safety(compared to buyside stuffs), but no freetime.

A dentist has safety, freetime, but not so much money.

If your objective is to maximize happiness, one should always choose safety and free time.

 
tireds:
workerbee:
most bankers dont have game, problem is they use banking as a cruch which after the 3rd time becomes overused by everyone whos remotely in banking. By the 4th time, most girls heard it and are over it.
That's true of every job tough. That's why men buy patek's and ferraris. Anyone can tell you hes rich, gotta back it up. That said ideally you wouldn't need conspicious consumption to get chicks.

Is that true of every job? Seems to me, many people do well socially/dating, despite having a shitty job (or merely an okay job). They connect with people on an individual level. Impressing them with their charm and personality, as opposed to their job and income.

 
gdnimrod:
Perhaps a hybrid of both choices.

Work like mad until im 35. Find a wife, make babies. Settle down.

Loving the Avatar

"The higher up the mountain, the more treacherous the path" -Frank Underwood
 
gdnimrod:
Perhaps a hybrid of both choices.

Work like mad until im 35. Find a wife, make babies. Settle down.

Loving the Avatar

"The higher up the mountain, the more treacherous the path" -Frank Underwood
 

I've always wanted a family. I've always wanted a wife. Don't call me a pussy because I don't want to sleep with a dozen different women each month, I think it takes a real man to acknowledge he wants commitment and meaningful intimacy. To each his own; I won't judge you for runnin' the town and slaying mad beezies, but don't hate on me for wanting something else for myself.

I also want a viable career. Sure, I'm interested primarily in banking. That desire juxtaposed against the first creates an inherent contradiction. I'm hoping time will allow the two to reconcile. Maybe a move from banking to a stint in PE/HF will allow me to enjoy both things I want.

I am permanently behind on PMs, it's not personal.
 

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