The Allure of Investment Banking

Though in recent years, many have highlighted the fact that the allure of investment banking has significantly dimmed given the multitude of undergrads wanting to head straight into the buy-side or technology. This however has not been a trend I personally agree with, as more and more students around me (from completely clueless engineers to law students) are disregarding their degree industry and aiming to head into finance.

Personally, I became interested quite early (my junior year of high school), and went through a BB interview process to the very last round. These past few years, I've become somewhat obsessed, watching from the sidelines and waiting for my turn.

Now here's a good discussion, at what age did you know investment banking was the right industry for you? Did you plan on making it a short stint, or did the fierce competition and devastatingly exciting work grab you and not let go?

 
Best Response

There's no great allure about investment banking, it's the misguided perception of prestige and a fat paycheck that is alluring. Honestly, if people picking up dog shit on the side of the road worked at a prestigious sounding "firm" and got paid over $100k, we'd be inundated with young grads and their "great passions" for the public good.

 

This line of reasoning never ends. I was in Big 4, thought Banking was my ticket. Worked/Lucked my way into a VC role, and pretty soon learned I'd rather be building than investing. Now i'm coding and I'll probably end up joining a startup and wondering why I'm not a doctor.

 
Funniest
ArcherVice:

There's no great allure about investment banking, it's the misguided perception of prestige and a fat paycheck that is alluring. Honestly, if people picking up dog shit on the side of the road worked at a prestigious sounding "firm" and got paid over $100k, we'd be inundated with young grads and their "great passions" for the public good.

"Incoming Dog Shit Scooper -- Central Park South Group"

 

For me?

I'm actually trying to that route because of what I know about my personality. I've got a combination of being someone who bores easily, is really good at crunching numbers(I like how working on a model carries the logical flow of programming without the arcane structure of most computer languages), and who is an ENFP type problem solver personality.

Basically I'm the kind of person who would be a terrible entrepeneur because I'm not good at proactively coming up with new ideas. I would never have thought to make something like FaceBook, the Squatty Potty, or the Pet Rock. What I am brilliant at is coming up with a creative solution to a problem that someone else throws at me.....which is a skill that's much more valuable in client service professions like consulting or banking than it is in startup or general management roles.

In my end I'm going to gravitate to any job that lets me do that kind of work with good career momentum. I have a different view on pay. When you're a few years older than average with a kid and a wife who can't work 60k/yr all in comp isn't going to cut it. I won't settle for less than the ability to keep them secure while building investments and having the cash to vacation somewhere nice 1x/year, but I'm fairly ambivelent about making more than that. Fancy suits aside, I intend to live a Bohemian lifestyle and excess cash will be put to work either for myself or for people and causes I believe in.

 

This is what I'm talking about--people will do just about anything logical or not to justify their wants. You want a family, a bohemian lifestyle and presumably good career momentum so you can 1) have more responsibility and 2) retire comfortably at some point. Banking is fundamentally at odds with having a family life or a bohemian lifestyle, and you'd get the pleasure of paying NYC or London prices for life. Take a government position on the other hand, there are solid paying jobs in D.C. or Cali, that offer security (it's government work), few work environments offer more size and responsibility than gov't positions, work/life balance (40hrs/wk), good benefits + vacation time (that you can actually take), generous pensions and a retirement age of 57 vs 65, 68, or never like most people. I'm not trying to pitch you on government service/employment, but on paper it gives you everything you're looking for... Yet you're still opting for a brutal work/life balance, which was basically what I was trying to point out.

 

You're not actually in banking are you? You're in for a HUGE reality check if you think you'll be doing anything creative as an analyst or even associate. Even at the MD level, a large majority of it isn't creative and all the banks are pitching pretty much the same thing to companies.

It's very rare work doesn't feel like work. That's why it's called work. You find what fits your strengths and try to maximize your earnings to the point that satisfies you. If you want true pleasure that's what life outside work is for. Then why banking if you do 100hr weeks? Well it's called delayed gratifications. If you want to be creative then you need to be an artist of some sort.

 

One may call it a vicious or virtuous cycle, depending on their perspective, but the high pay and glitzy offices/location --> attractiveness to young people --> herd behavior --> high competition --> great branding for IB's who utlizie tons of resources to attract said young people --> positive feedback from young people --> etc. I think the people who are more actually interested in finance intellectually may be more likely to enjoy it once they're there, but it seems that those end up being more interested in the buy side ultimately, so you end up with those who stay in banking being there really for the money/prestige on average.

 
TopChedder:

Almost every ibanker goes into it for materialistic reasons. That's the allure plain and simple. The only interview question for ibanking should be "how much shit are you willing to put up with and for how long?"

Same for Big 4 if we're being honest.....

"Even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there" - Will Rogers
 
Controversial

First time poster/now ex-lurker

An alum I spoke to who worked in IB quite a while back seems to think that the "allure" of IB these days is due to a few reasons that don't commensurate with the realities of IB today.

  1. More and more people know about IB now, thanks to the internet and increased coverage on the news, especially since 07/08. The media and the politicians, which can't seem to get enough of complaining about "outrageous wall street pay" are perpetuating the myth that somehow, bankers shit gold like Tywin Lannister did before he got done in (especially if they work at Goldman Sachs).

The fact of the matter is, in many areas of IB, especially market making in S&T (something traders devote most of their time to, over prop trading), margins simply aren't what they used to be. M&A seems to be somewhat more resistant to technologically and institutionally driven (think increased regulation) declines in IB profits, but as we all know, M&A is highly cyclical, and business can rapidly increase or decrease for any number of reasons, within a given time period. The status of things such as equity research as "profit centers" is also questionable, as they generate far less revenue in the business environment, where a lot of large funds internalized the idea generation process. In other words, people don't pay directly for research like they used to. Those "20k across the board" bonuses you've been hearing about on WSO for research analysts? That's reality catching up and kicking in.

  1. People know about IB and the accompanying pay, prestige, exit opps in a somewhat juvenile context, but people rarely realize the true opportunity costs associated with working at an investment bank. For most people, the long, inconsistent hours (especially in M&A) and the everyday toil can be literally soul-crushing. Furthermore, if you're great at investing, guess what? Compliance will significantly hamper your ability to do anything productive with the pile of cash you have lying around (if you haven't been going out for bottle service all weekend every week, anyway).

Even if you do get pre-clearance from compliance, you'll have to choose from a standard list - getting creative, and not using that list, means you have to deal with compliance even more than you already have. Not that you'll have a whole lot of energy to do personal trading either way - with compliance getting in the way, it's almost not worth the trouble, unless you're one of those people who can function on 2-3 hours of sleep a night. Sure, you're likely to get paid at least six figures starting at the right gig, but it can be about as dull as hammering nails into a wall over and over again, if you're not at least quite passionate about the markets in general.

I suppose I could go on and on, but what does a kid like me know, eh? I have no idea why I even took the time to type all of this up.

Note: Despite being a freshman with 0 actual industry experience, I'm aware that when people say "IB" on WSO, they mean M&A. This bewilders me, so I'm going based off what I know instead.

 

I am a High School senior, and my friends and I are going to relatively good schools (and at this time) and think we want to go for I-banking for two years. These are our (naive) thoughts.

  1. Start your career off with a fantastic name on your resume.
  2. High pay that can be saved and provide you a cushion for the near future.
  3. Opportunities after the two years of sh*. And if you don't like finance you still go into Law or Medicine.
  4. Surrounded by smart and similar people that you become close with and gives you a good network
  5. Provides you with an easy template for your 20s. Great undergrad to 2 years IBanking to 2 years PE to Bschool to whatever you want. Takes anyway from any fears about what is next for 10 or so years.
  6. Prestige? Makes us feel that our work to get into a top school was worth it by not 'settling' for a mediocre job that can be obtained at Rutgers.
  7. The opportunity to live in and afford the best (and most fun) cities in the world. How else would you live in NYC, London, Singapore, and San Francisco?
 

Sounds like the typical disgruntled middle class 45 year old's advice- why would you want to be selling your time for money coding? Sure tech is hot today, but industries shift and without a crystal ball you can't know where we will be in 10 years.

How about learn to sell? Revenue generation isn't going anywhere, and you could go sell SaaS, be in the "hot" tech sector, and still have an actually universal marketable skill.

 
jackdonaghy26:

I am a High School senior, and my friends and I are going to relatively good schools (and at this time) and think we want to go for I-banking for two years. These are our (naive) thoughts.

1. Start your career off with a fantastic name on your resume.
2. High pay that can be saved and provide you a cushion for the near future.
3. Opportunities after the two years of sh*. And if you don't like finance you still go into Law or Medicine.
4. Surrounded by smart and similar people that you become close with and gives you a good network
5. Provides you with an easy template for your 20s. Great undergrad to 2 years IBanking to 2 years PE to Bschool to whatever you want. Takes anyway from any fears about what is next for 10 or so years.
6. Prestige? Makes us feel that our work to get into a top school was worth it by not 'settling' for a mediocre job that can be obtained at Rutgers.
7. The opportunity to live in and afford the best (and most fun) cities in the world. How else would you live in NYC, London, Singapore, and San Francisco?

  1. There are plenty of companies with fantastic names that don't start with Goldman and Morgan. Google. Facebook. Uber. Jump Trading. Palantir. MARSOC.
  2. High pay is meaningless if your hours are also absurdly high. One of the first things they teach you in finance is the Time Value of Money.
  3. How does one leave IB and go into Medicine? Apart from PE/HF, what opportunities are you talking about? Let's be realistic, almost the same as you'd get leaving undergrad, except now you have more time to decide what you want out of life. It's more like a 2-year deferral of doing soul searching.
  4. You can develop a strong network in any industry. Other examples of good networks: military, tech, pharma, etc.
  5. So basically staying within your comfort zone and not taking any risk in your life. If you don't want any fear or uncertainty, why not check into a nursing home? How is this a positive again?
  6. Mediocre job that can be obtained at Rutgers? Sorry to burst your validation bubble, but plenty of kids make it to top-tier groups from state schools you've never heard of, with majors you'd laugh at. Real life isn't a pure meritocracy.
  7. NYC, London and HK are all home to over 7 million people. A fraction of whom work in finance. Can they all afford it? For the most part yes. They might not be going to 1OAK weekly and throwing stacks at the bouncers, but they're there, enjoying the city. And what's the point of affording it if all you can spare is that 36 hour stretch after 8pm on Friday until your staffer tells you go get back in there on Sunday?

This isn't meant as an attack on finance or you. I'm on this board just like everyone else. But I'd like to provide you with some reality on your expectations. Unhappiness is a result from your expectations exceeding your realities, and this should give you some devil's advocate to think about.

 

Man, wish I knew about banking and high finance when I was only a senior in hs. I honestly didn't even know about investment banking until my jr year in college. cray

twitter: @StoicTrader1 instagram: @StoicTrader1
 

1)While it's great that you and your friends are thinking ahead and trying to plan a path to success, you should be partying right now and basking in the glory of being a senior in highschool 2) While in college work hard to meet bishes and earn top grades, try not to develop a substance abuse problem 3) Enjoy your life while you have one and do not fantasize about work- college is a fantasy life all its own

best of luck

 

Yeah I don't see what is so hard to get here. Learn great skills, good branding, meet great people, develop professionally, increase options, great pay, get to be in the best city, etc. The better question is why everyone is not pursuing it? I think there are reasons not to (besides that they cannot get in), but they have to give a good justification.

 

Great Skills - how to align boxes perfectly in power point and how to use excel without a mouse Develop professionally - yes between all the free time you don't have Increasing options - Did you notice the number of hedge funds that were closing? Great Pay - Yeah but you can also get great pay in other fields without working anywhere near the same number of hours Best city - DB has an office in Jacksonville, FL, Wells is headquartered in NC. Also plenty of boutiques in the middle of nowhere if you go looking.
Honestly all things considered, going into IB today can seem like the stranger decision

 

IB is like a cage where a bunch of smart, and driven individuals meet up to clean elephant dung for lots of money.

Yes the pay is great, Yes you develop a solid network, Very unlikely you're passionate about cleaning elephant dung...You might like selling it though

I think- therefore I fuck
 

At my business school, it's called the "atrium effect". It's the business school equivalent of "keeping up with the joneses." You compare yourself towards everyone around you. People at top schools are competitive. At top schools, the competition is to get the best job you can. People have spent their lives trying to be the best, and they want to continue to be so. Getting a top IB (or tech, or consulting) job is how you "win."

There's sociopaths, nerds, virgins, jocks, and normal kids...I don't think it's always an insecure thing as posters above have alluded to (Although it tilts this way because its hard, albeit it not impossible, to have an active social life and get into top college and do well...I think all top jobs suffer from having a lot of insufferable people). Some of the cooler and most popular kids in school went into banking...and some of the nerdiest/weirdest.

That said, as someone nearing 30, wasting your youth doing banking might not be worth it for a lot of people. I struck out during '09 and ended up doing Ops. I was sad and depressed because I was competitive. That said, it was one of the best things that happened to me. I got to go on a bunch of dates, travel extensively, made enough money to do what I wanted, took up hobbies and played sports, ran marathons, etc. Eventually went to a M7 business school, where I'm surrounded by former front office bankers. Ended up getting the same post-mba level job as them too in consulting. Only thing I missed out on is a little bit of money I could have saved, but most of them barely saved any money anyways.

Of the 20 people i know who did banking out of undergrad, exactly one has done the IB - > PE -> partner track successfully. Over half dropped out as an analyst. The remainded did a year or two as PE associate or IB associate, before leaving for corp dev /corp fin/ shitty start-up. It's much harder than people realize to make MD or stick around in PE and become a BSD.

 
Hillary2016:

At my business school, it's called the "atrium effect". It's the business school equivalent of "keeping up with the joneses." You compare yourself towards everyone around you. People at top schools are competitive. At top schools, the competition is to get the best job you can. People have spent their lives trying to be the best, and they want to continue to be so. Getting a top IB (or tech, or consulting) job is how you "win."

There's sociopaths, nerds, virgins, jocks, and normal kids...I don't think it's always an insecure thing as posters above have alluded to (Although it tilts this way because its hard, albeit it not impossible, to have an active social life and get into top college and do well...I think all top jobs suffer from having a lot of insufferable people). Some of the cooler and most popular kids in school went into banking...and some of the nerdiest/weirdest.

That said, as someone nearing 30, wasting your youth doing banking might not be worth it for a lot of people. I struck out during '09 and ended up doing Ops. I was sad and depressed because I was competitive. That said, it was one of the best things that happened to me. I got to go on a bunch of dates, travel extensively, made enough money to do what I wanted, took up hobbies and played sports, ran marathons, etc. Eventually went to a M7 business school, where I'm surrounded by former front office bankers. Ended up getting the same post-mba level job as them too in consulting. Only thing I missed out on is a little bit of money I could have saved, but most of them barely saved any money anyways.

Of the 20 people i know who did banking out of undergrad, exactly one has done the IB - > PE -> partner track successfully. Over half dropped out as an analyst. The remainded did a year or two as PE associate or IB associate, before leaving for corp dev /corp fin/ shitty start-up. It's much harder than people realize to make MD or stick around in PE and become a BSD.

Good post, but did you notice how set you are on comparing yourself to front office bankers and their outcome?

 
dutchduke:
Hillary2016:

At my business school, it's called the "atrium effect". It's the business school equivalent of "keeping up with the joneses." You compare yourself towards everyone around you. People at top schools are competitive. At top schools, the competition is to get the best job you can. People have spent their lives trying to be the best, and they want to continue to be so. Getting a top IB (or tech, or consulting) job is how you "win."There's sociopaths, nerds, virgins, jocks, and normal kids...I don't think it's always an insecure thing as posters above have alluded to (Although it tilts this way because its hard, albeit it not impossible, to have an active social life and get into top college and do well...I think all top jobs suffer from having a lot of insufferable people). Some of the cooler and most popular kids in school went into banking...and some of the nerdiest/weirdest.That said, as someone nearing 30, wasting your youth doing banking might not be worth it for a lot of people. I struck out during '09 and ended up doing Ops. I was sad and depressed because I was competitive. That said, it was one of the best things that happened to me. I got to go on a bunch of dates, travel extensively, made enough money to do what I wanted, took up hobbies and played sports, ran marathons, etc. Eventually went to a M7 business school, where I'm surrounded by former front office bankers. Ended up getting the same post-mba level job as them too in consulting. Only thing I missed out on is a little bit of money I could have saved, but most of them barely saved any money anyways.Of the 20 people i know who did banking out of undergrad, exactly one has done the IB - > PE -> partner track successfully. Over half dropped out as an analyst. The remainded did a year or two as PE associate or IB associate, before leaving for corp dev /corp fin/ shitty start-up. It's much harder than people realize to make MD or stick around in PE and become a BSD.

Good post, but did you notice how set you are on comparing yourself to front office bankers and their outcome?

You should always know your target audience, and mold your message appropriately. This is an IB message board.

 

I think IB has numerous things that are attractive. Undoubtedly there are some false perceptions (i.e. bottles & models), but, for me at least, the greatest attraction to IB is the structured nature of the business and the exposure to individuals who share similar ideologies to myself. I mean sure wearing a t-shirt and working on a bean bag seems nice, but realistically I do not think I would be able to accomplish anything productive if that was my working environment.

 

I'm British but what I suppose you'd call a 'Rising high school junior' in the US. Will post this in the hope that if I'm seriously mistaken about something I can get some advice on what I'm doing wrong.

Essentially, since the British schooling system forces one into specialisation quite quickly, asking you to apply to study a specific subject at university while still in high school, of which your eligibility is decided by the 3-4 subjects you study in the last two years, it becomes pertinent to do long term thinking, since at 15 the decision to study the wrong combination at A Level means not being able to study for a specific degree and therefore limit your career options, etc.

And so, naturally, my first instinct was to ask which are highest paying and have a transferrable skill set that can be used to leverage higher paying jobs. IB does that (albeit the skills seem only transferrable to other finance jobs) and doesn't need a particular course of action to study towards. In that regard, it's a 'safe' option. Excruciating hours of mindless work (according to those who work in the area), but ultimately if you're not working on a great startup idea and don't have a 'calling' to a profession like medicine, perfectly sensible in terms of outlook.

Beyond that, though my knowledge is pretty sparse still, the industry (especially in regards to M&A and dealmaking in general) looks particularly interesting! Outside of school, I've spent a lot of my time playing and analysing poker, I love the buzz of my sales job, and I especially like the games played with other people. I like the feel of closing a sale or bluffing a hand or strategising against the opposing team on the field. Though at the entry level I won't get any real exposure to this beyond (petty) office politics, the prospect of being involved in this later on is exciting.

Thus, the allure of investment banking (and private equity, given probably that's where I will want to end up), is a mixture of both an interest in the field (how can we structure this so that the deal holds out? What are the leverage points? Can we get more? What exactly is the worth of doing this to that company) and what seems like a match in personal traits, especially since I'm probably an A-type personally (an overbearing want to achieve and win).

Of course, given internships and some time on the job, I might decide I hate it. It's way too early to say but right now it seems like (more-or-less) the best option. If I can optimise my application to get into the buy-side then clearly that'd be better for my health but otherwise it sounds like fun! In case it isn't, I'm studying maths and sciences now and probably will continue with maths at university given my achievement in it this far has been stellar (completed A Level maths already - 2 years early, for instance.)

 

Has anyone else here read Peter Theil's book/manifesto Zero to One? Yes, I know, it's Peter Theil; I know a lot of his bold ideas are highly scrutinized, and justifiably so, but I think he has some really interesting thoughts on the popularity of IB or management consulting careers. Here's a quote from the aforementioned book:

"CREATIVE MONOPOLY means new products that benefit everybody and sustainable profits for the creator. Competition means no profits for anybody, no meaningful differentiation, and a struggle for survival. So why do people believe that competition is healthy? The answer is that competition is not just an economic concept or a simple inconvenience that individuals and companies must deal with in the marketplace. More than anything else, competition is an ideology—the ideology—that pervades our society and distorts our thinking. We preach competition, internalize its necessity, and enact its commandments; and as a result, we trap ourselves within it—even though the more we compete, the less we gain.

"This is a simple truth, but we’ve all been trained to ignore it. Our educational system both drives and reflects our obsession with competition. Grades themselves allow precise measurement of each student’s competitiveness; pupils with the highest marks receive status and credentials. We teach every young person the same subjects in mostly the same ways, irrespective of individual talents and preferences. Students who don’t learn best by sitting still at a desk are made to feel somehow inferior, while children who excel on conventional measures like tests and assignments end up defining their identities in terms of this weirdly contrived academic parallel reality.

"And it gets worse as students ascend to higher levels of the tournament. Elite students climb confidently until they reach a level of competition sufficiently intense to beat their dreams out of them. Higher education is the place where people who had big plans in high school get stuck in fierce rivalries with equally smart peers over conventional careers like management consulting and investment banking. For the privilege of being turned into conformists, students (or their families) pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in skyrocketing tuition that continues to outpace inflation. Why are we doing this to ourselves?"

Basically, he theorizes that investment banking has such tremendous allure is because as the world becomes more complex and full of regulation and barriers to entry, entrepreneurism becomes scarier, and creativity and originality in careers is forsaken. Smart, competitive college kids figure out that investment banking is the risk-averse way to become rich. Theil then takes this point and then kind of turns it into a bitchfest about how not enough kids have the PayPal Mafia/Silicon Valley mindset and shouldn't pay go to Stanford in the first place etc., but I think the underlying truth is compelling.

"A modest man, with much to be modest about"
 
Janet Yellen's Fuccboi:

Basically, he theorizes that investment banking has such tremendous allure is because as the world becomes more complex and full of regulation and barriers to entry, entrepreneurism becomes scarier, and creativity and originality in careers is forsaken. Smart, competitive college kids figure out that investment banking is the risk-averse way to become rich. Theil then takes this point and then kind of turns it into a bitchfest about how not enough kids have the PayPal Mafia/Silicon Valley mindset and shouldn't pay go to Stanford in the first place etc., but I think the underlying truth is compelling.

This. Dan Primack wrote on April 22 that he believes that the American Dream is dead. All of the monkies here don't seem too far from his observation that people don't feel that their $100k a year salaries are okay (he talks about incomes in excess of $200k, but no one at the analyst level has families to take care of, I don't doubt). When monkies here start making $250k, will that be enough? How about throw in 2.5 kids? Maybe you take that salary put it in something and you'll be fine.

I wonder whether or not folks know that a.) banking doesn't really pay that much to make it the golden ticket. b.) If you're smart enough and young enough, there are things to do that are would be better pursued. With my goals, I would be sure that money is the 2nd or 3rd reason that I want to pursue a banking analyst post.

Also, it's interesting to think about that. If more kids realized that instead of fascinating about a fleeting 'prestigious' iBanking career, would the world's challenges left in engineering and medicine be solved by now? It takes bright youthful armies to solve those problems because the skills have to be developed early. All of this is good stuff and it's interesting to ponder what is going on when the world has been on hold since the mid-20th century and we have an overwhelming amount of kids going into banking.

 

Those surveys are stupid along with most of what people think as the world getting worse. If the American Dream is to become the next Carl Icahn, then of course essentially everyone will be disappointed. The problem is not the Dream is dead, it is people have less attention spans and higher expectations. They are not ok anymore with it taking more than a generation and can't accept that the world is becoming more competitive. It never was a nice world out there - just the things that used to provide competitive advantages no longer. The economy is dynamic and capitalism is generally alive and well. These people would not make great investors or managers based on their poor analytical skills.

 

I don't think the American dream is dead, but people's expectations have certainly shifted away from reality. Banking isn't the golden ticket compared to what exactly? You're not making tech billionaire money, but you are getting paid several magnitudes more than the average American. Straight out of college. Continuing on the track it's not unreasonable to be making 10 or 20 times the average income before you're 30. 250k is certainly more than enough for a family to get by on. The fact the people are so entitled and out of touch to believe that this isn't a "golden ticket" or an extremely fortunate position to be in is unbelievable.

There are jobs that pay more, but they're either more competitive or demand an entirely different skill set. And people are definitely in this for the money over the prestige. If you want the brain drain in medicine to stop, you simply need to offer more money. The most competitive kids in my parents' class at HYP predominantly went into medicine. Between their class and mine, people started to move into finance. My class at HYP started shifting away from finance and into tech. People are following the money.

 

Yeah, Peter Theil is probably close to the embodiment of the post-Steve Jobs "Think Different" Arrogant Weirdo Silicon Valley Billionaire Stereotype, untouchable simply because he's so obscenely wealthy. But I won't be the one to knock him.

Thanks btw!

"A modest man, with much to be modest about"
 

Investment Banking is the path for risk-adverse people. It's tried and tested, and has stood the test of time. Sure, you'll have bubbles here and there, but most people get out just fine.

But as with all other industries, automation and AI will eat up more spots, and make it more difficult for new and aspiring bankers.

Might as well join some FinTech startup, and hope you'll get bought up by some bank.

 

Also, the world has improved in almost every single way. People have to stop complaining. The number of products and services has exploded, the types of food is better, there are more cities, nicer houses, technology, more human rights, less crime, more work life balance, less global poverty etc. People are just focusing on a small adjustment in the economy as everyone catches up in relative terms where we aren't growing as fast. Never have the barriers to entry to start a business been lower or the vast disruptions against the status quo potentially open up more opportunities.

 

You guys need to chill w/ the MS, even if you don't 'like' what you hear! It's like extremists run this board sometimes lol

Nonetheless, the American Dream is not really a physical thing of jobs and other stuff where you would find competition, though, is it?

Before America had it's infrastructure the American Dream was alive and well in it's most readiest form to affect people's lives.

Sidebar: your argument is that 'surveys like that are stupid'? Seriously though... lol bruhhh

 

First, I never gave you MS.

Second, all I was saying that there has been a trend these days to bring up this thing called the American Dream like it is an entitlement and people were so nice back them to give it to them. The U.S was just developing and most countries were shitty so of course just by coming here your life was better. Nobody had ever known a system where you actually can choose your career and be free (read history on how little choice people used to have). There are a ton of things that have changed since then. If you want to feel that type of rush again, maybe go to a new island and try to settle there and you'll notice a lot more open space and opportunity.

 

The whole issue about career choices and career shift is due high expectations rather than passion and fitness for the job and when those expectations are not met, people start complaining. Trust me, if someone is working at M&A and hates it, it does not mean M&A is horrible it just then he or she is not meant to be there in the first place, they just pretending to like it or deceiving themselves. I have seen people do shitty hours, going through divorce, losing custody of their children and worse yet they never lose their attachment to their jobs and very successful career wise. This is true in banking, medicine, science engineering, farming or whatever. Everyone of us is born with certain capabilities that fit certain jobs. I know some people who just cant tolerate sleeping more than 3 hours, while others need 8 and some extreme needing 12 hours.

I am a live example here, I like following economics and finance forums, newspaper, colleagues and I study finance materials in my spare time. I hate my career in medicine not because of hours or stress or income, this is my profile:

working hours: 07:30 to 13:30 ( decent 6 hours) 5 days a week No On-calls duties Free weekends Annual income about 180K takehome ( tax free/ I am not working in the US) No stress all about routine preventive services/public health

I can switch to finance any time for more hours and lower pay, if i can get a chance. All my friends call me crazy, but I dont care what they think, I want to be happy in what I do for the rest of my life.

How/why i Choose medicine ? basically for few factors:

  1. Top performers at school. In my country its almost tradition that elite (90 plus score) go to medicine, while second group ( 80 plus ) go to engineering and sorry to say that others ( called) losers end up in fields like business, finance, sciences and even law !!
  2. Pressure from parents for prestigious medical career.
  3. Ill information or lack of informations about finance fields, especially that many finance graduates are just terrible in knowledge, skills and talent in my country.

Now, please do not get me wrong, this is not to claim that medicine is a terrible career, it is a great career but again for those who like it just like engineering, law, science...etc,

Just my opinion.

 

ya you sound crazy to me too, lol. grass is always greener, I could see you getting there then completely regretting it after a year. your earnings and schedule sounds too good to be true.

twitter: @StoicTrader1 instagram: @StoicTrader1
 

Nay dude, it is all true, the benefits of being a citizen of an oil and gas rich country. Regret !! why regret ? life for me is all about taking risks. Dude you probably think (a job) is all about making a living but this not how I view my profession. Grass is always greener ! That is very true but every situation is different I wish I can elaborate but I like to keep my cards hidden for a while.

 

Nay dude, it is all true, the benefits of being a citizen of an oil and gas rich country. Regret !! why regret ? life for me is all about taking risks. Dude you probably think (a job) is all about making a living but this not how I view my profession. Grass is always greener ! That is very true but every situation is different I wish I can elaborate but I like to keep my cards hidden for a while.

 

The "allure" of investment banking has significantly diminished. I think much of this is due to grads moving to big and/or startup tech companies. For the vast majority of people, that type of work is more interesting and far more rewarding. You can still do pretty good on the street but investment banking is not what it used to be. To put it in perspective:
The goal for everyone here seems to be to move to the buyside but even that's not the same anymore. Hedge funds are just a sales game like anything else on the street and now you're competing with everybody and their cousin for a slice of an institutional clients funds. Maybe you will join a prestigious fund or perhaps you will show your entrepreneurial side and start your own. Either way, you clean up nicely collecting on fees and make good money. 15 years later you look back and realize you significantly under-performed the S&P. Moral of the story: if money isn't your #1 priority, then this game probably isn't for you.

 
iggs99988:

The allure of Ibanking is alive and well: those who downplay it are either smug bankers who have forgot what a comparatively comfy lifestyle they lead, or those who didn't come close to making it in.

I'm curious what makes you qualified to say this

 

What makes me qualified to say this? Math. Take a look at the number of applicants who apply to bulge bracket banks (i think it was something like 95,000 for the CM/IBD summer class of 2015 at MS) and the number of full-time front office seats. Now compare application numbers YOY since the financial crisis and I think you will see a trend...

As far as WHY banking is alive and well, I think my statement is pretty transparent. The vast majority of posters on this board fall into two camps:

Camp 1: Those who managed to get the job and either like it and stay or after some time really fucking hate it Camp 2: Those who didn't manage to get the job

You will basically never see Camp 3: Those who knowing what they now know, turning back time and given the same access to ibanking as a college senior, would pursue something categorically different.

Why don't you see this camp? Because they're statistical noise. The type of person who goes into finance isn't after changing the world or making a difference. These people, if given the same choices, wouldn't be math teachers, humanitarians, accountants etc. etc. It's selection bias. Everyone is either directly after money now, or after some indirect future opportunity, which will lead to money. The end goal is the same for everyone. That's why everyone deals with the bullshit as long as they can / want to tolerate it. You think I went to an ivy league school and paid over a hundred grand for my degree so that I can be an Excel wizard?

Beyond the surface niceties of college major and personal background idiosyncrasies , the substance and profile of everyone pursing this job is largely the same. That's why I don't buy the "fading allure of banking" pitch or scorned banker bullshit because, last I checked, money's still in style.

http://www.crainsnewyork.com/article/20140624/FINANCE/140629933/morgan-…

 

Humans have had pecking orders and symbolic hierarchies since time immemorial. We're genetically programmed to seek symbolic status within a society. IBD just happens to be flavour of the day in this era (though less so since the rise of Big Tech and unicorn startups). "IBD" In Han dynasty China was making it in the imperial examinations to become a state official. In 17th century Britain IBD was being a trader in the East India Company and looting mad bank. Heck even a few decades ago Law was the IBD and even within finance, corporate finance was the most prestigious. It feels really good to feel you're in an elite group and can look down on most others. We're built that way.

Relevant reading if you have journal access: (oops can't post links, google "Career Funneling: How Elite Students Learn to Define and Desire ‘‘Prestigious’’ Jobs")

 

If I could take a sponge, soak it in soapy water & shove it down your throats.. that's exactly what i'd do to all you high school kids who profess this is what i want to do with my life bullshit..

effin' 16-17yr olds.. if any of you were genuinely smart, you would apply yourselves to a more productive career path.

 

Im reiterating what a lot of people said but this is the majority of the "allure." You get naive kids who see someone they know getting fat paychecks almost instantly out of college when they only needed to go to a minimum 4 yrs of school to get this type of paycheck versus 7+ years of school to become a Doctor, lawyer, PT, or even getting your PHD and on top of those extra years of school you still have to wait a few years after you graduate to start getting the equivalent pay of a banker. now don't get me wrong there are other great jobs that you can get with a BA degree but for the most part they're not instant payouts. The location of the job draws people in too, these companies are located in some of the greatest cities in the world. Finally is the prestige, people want to say the classic line "goldman fucking sachs ever heard of it?"

 

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