PubFin vs Corp Banking - Salary/Bonus/Hours

At the (post-MBA) Associate+ levels - How would you rank BB PubFin vs BB Corp Banking in terms of salary/bonus, as well as hours worked. Are they equal?

What if I also added ECM and DCM to the mix (at both EB and BB)? <-- does this change things?

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Focusing on just BBs and ignoring the exact firm, group performance, individual performance, etc. then Comp - ECM/DCM > Public Finance > Corp Banking and WLB would be reverse (i.e. Corp banking has the best WLB and ECM/DCM has the worst). All of these are among the best balance of pay and wlb if you want to be in banking for the duration of your career.

A couple notes below:

  • CB varies from BB to BB. JPM/BofA/Citi all work (and pay) more than their BB peers
  • In PubFin, those focused on NFP Healthcare and P3s likely make (and work) more than their other PubFin peers. Those on advisory heavy teams likely have hours/comp similar to beyond those of ECM/DCM. There is also a steep pay drop gap between BBs and MMs / Regional Firms
  • If you're including LevFin as part of DCM, then they work (and make) the most on average out of everything mentioned here
  • ABS / Securitization and Project Finance groups also provide similar pay and wlb to ECM/DCM, PubFin, and CB
 

There are a few select EB pubfin firms, and also not all BBs have a strong pubfin group either (see Citi collapsing it, UBS not being a big player, etc.). For EB's, there is already some good information available on this site, but from what I recall:

 

1) All the BBs likely do some advisory. Its really is team / sector dependent. In general NFP HC does the most advisory work, followed by P3 teams. Some Power, Transpo, and Higher Ed teams also do a their fair share of advisory work, while others do none. You can really only figure this out by being in the space / networking. Off the top of my head, in the NFP HC space the GS team does the most followed by Jefferies (ex-Citi team) and RBC. In the P3 world Barclays (both the og team + the Citi team that joined) do the most.

2) No EBs have major PubFin teams. You're best off going the BB route if possible. 

 

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