Dealing with friends that are anti-Wall Street
A good high school friend of mine was visiting NYC for the first time and staying with me for the week. I’ve always known him to be liberal and one to side closer to Bernie in his stance on Wall Street, but it all seemed to be more prevalent and bothersome this trip.
Some background: my friend is a pretty smart guy working in engineering on some cool stuff. He got his bachelors and masters at good engineering, but non-target, schools, so he was never surrounded by friends and people making Wall Street their ambition. I work in algo trading at a prop shop with an Ivy League degree. We both grew up in middle/upper-middle class suburban America.
We always got along over an appreciation of STEM, but he always viewed my career as one with no value add to society and filled with greedy characters. He finds parts of Manhattan to be “shrines for the wealthy” - referring to The Oculus for example, and thinks the worship of excessive wealth is disgusting and one of his general problems with Wall Street. I understand I shouldn’t take some of these things personally, and I usually don’t, but now that I’ve been in the industry for 2+ years working hard, I can’t help but feel like parts of me are being attacked. He also thinks people on Wall Street can be arrogant (I agree to an extent), and will bias his opinions of conversations I try to have with him in that light - e.g. I told him about some guy I saw at the gym a couple months ago that started badgering me about his psuedo-science based trading which I thought was b.s. His viewpoint was that I was being very arrogant for not listening to someone else (which I partially had) and only viewing the "right" way to do things through a certain lens that's my own. I do in fact do the job everyday, I can have an opinion on such things once I’ve been exposed at a high level. I’m sure a part of how he feels has been influenced by his surrounding liberal state school friends. I recall a much more heated conversation with one a while back.
I am unsure how to respond in such situations. I haven’t been getting defensive and I kinda just let it slide so far. Have you guys been in similar situations and how would you advise handling it? I feel like I need to have an honest conversation with my friend about how I interpret some of these things (I do think he lacks a certain degree of self awareness), but I also think it may not change much or anything at all.
Your situation seems very awkward. It can sometimes be very challenging trying to maintain relationships with liberal, non targets.
I’d suggest that you start denigrating about people who have poor social awareness, especially in terms of saying distasteful things about something close to an individual that could potentially be harmful.
Hell, maybe even throw in a jab or two about how everything wouldn’t be funded or wide spread without that greedy street.
Some people go to study STEM fields and get out of school and are at times threatened by their worth when their salary doesn't keep up with 'business majors'. I think one thing to keep in mind is that the STEM degree is challenging and you're basically guaranteed a job after college (I'm mainly thinking Engineering here).
In contrast, the finance/business majors in undergrad are easier compared to STEM, but the hard part is being top 5% in your class with the business/finance major to get into the top banking and consulting gigs. Business/finance grads who made it to Wall Street often come with 3.6 - 4.0 GPAs while the STEM majors often get 3.0 - 3.5 GPAs, which is adequate to get a job. STEM majors always look down at business/finance majors in undergrad, but they can't say sh** when you're making multiples of their salary after graduation.
Your friend seems like a mediocre STEM friend. Top STEM majors blaze their own trail. Don't worry about his petty stabs at your profession. "They hate us cause they ain't us..."
I’m fairly liberal myself, except I like money more
"if you really want to do this with your life, you have to believe you're necessary."
- Margin Call
1:09
https://youtu.be/nBEgJZdd2BQ?t=69
As someone who is left leaning, I would take the angle of education when it comes up. Who exactly on Wall Street are they mad at? There is a growing leftist movement that seems to think that executive level leadership, Wall Street/PE are not necessary for society to function. I’d focus on the value they add while validating that yes some people are unnecessarily greedy and do shitty things, but that’s not why you love what you do. The tricky/awkwardness is there are definitely some parts of Wall Street/high finance that you can argue destroy more value than they add, but the overwhelming majority of high finance jobs are not only necessary but beneficial and part of a healthy society. Instead of trying to convince them that they are wrong, help them see the grey.
I have a bunch of friends who are of the left-winged persuasion, but they've been accepting of my career aspirations since we got to know each other back in high school. Honestly, the job you take really shouldn't matter to your friend unless you've been put into a deep squeeze by some law-dodging conglomerate, the kind of thing you'd see in a dumb movie with Judge Reinhold or something. It's not to say that his views aren't valuable, but he's got to let you do what you want to do with your life, rather than trying to convince you to take his dream job. Every man is, and should be, built strong under his own ideas.
With regard to how to deal with this, I'd try to talk with him about how you feel in a non abrasive yet firm way of speaking, and if he is a good friend, perhaps he will be able to understand that and give his opinions where they are both wanted and warranted. As I said, many of my friends have left-winged political biases that clash with my Reaganite views, and I know that they would be understanding if I voiced how I felt about something of this nature. A true friend will always take your opinion into consideration.
Hopefully, this advice can help you. Good luck.
Also, for any of you that didn't get the Judge Reinhold reference, this is the movie to which I referred:
damn I didn't know that actor was in anything other than Seinfeld
Holy shit....Judge Reinhold...Rick Moranis....Danny Devito.....it's a Muderer's Row of late 80s / early 90s straight-to-video All Stars....
He is pretty right about the Oculus being ugly
Yes but it connects the PATH train to the New York City subway system. So while it's expensive it's definitely a utilitarian structure.
You guys get defensive? I myself blush af when my non-finance friends talk about their impression of what finance dudes do. They seem to think all finance dudes are type-A personalities who all grind to the bone while pulling in bucket loads of cash while advising multi-billion dollar deals every day while managing billion dollar portfolios while making billionaires fuck tons richer lolll. I told one engineering guy about my friend and fellow SA who's dad is the CEO of the bank who took home 40 mil at one point during one monster year and he said 'Damn seriously that's honestly a serious perk about being in fyyyyyynance' and I blushed af cuz I was thinking 'Lord the vast majority of finance bros run after their analyst stint and never get to that level'
Also blush whenever someone thinks investment bankers control the economy or some shit and I'm like 'Thanks for your impression of us? Hope to get to that level some day. I have to work harder'. Loll. I'm not living up to these people's expectations man, you're only a banker if you control the economy
I only get defensive when they call it 'fyyyynance'. It's obviously 'fuh-nance' (you have to roll it neatly off your tongue like a 18th century Baron with an estate), you can't change my mind on this
Finance is glorified paper pushing. It's the plumbing of the world. Just moving resources to where they can be best consumed.
Stop thinking that finance is some glorified pursuit and get your fucking head out of your ass. Great, someone has a different opinion than you do. Learn how to deal with people outside your bubble. Jesus it's sad reading stuff like this.
I would agree with you if he was a random person, a family member, etc. saying negative/bitter things.
But he's a friend. You choose your friends. Why spend your time with someone without a chip on their shoulder?
Pretty much this. A lot of high finance basically just exists to keep wealthy people wealthy. Does that mean the employees within that framework are bad people? No, of course not, but I can tell you that if I stopped doing my job the only people that would suffer are people who are already unreasonably wealthy lol.
As others have stated you need to come to terms that “working at a prop firm out of school” is truly adding minimal value to society. Even within finance jobs you really on the far end of jobs that do not exist on a “deserted island”.
That said where I draw the line with such people and get annoyed is when they think a profession defines who someone is. Some prop traders are the most charitable people out there taking care of their families, donating to various causes and finding other ways to enrich the earth.
Just like some doctors rush diagnosis to get more surgery hours and make it easy for insurance. Some professors sell out to give easy research reports to F500 and so on.
If your friend solely thinks someone's profession defines them as virtuous or not, then they may not be worth keeping around.
I really like the last paragraph in this one and I agree. I think he can disassociate the two, but sometimes (like currently) I'm so busy a good chunk of my life is the profession, and it's hard for me to take it impersonally. Fwiw, I don’t think prop trading is a real value add or anything either. I do what I do because I want to constantly learn a variety of skills that engage me, do research oriented work, and make a lot of money to have a good life.
I’ve found it’s best just to let the loser friends go. Friendships should be fun and supportive, they are not family, so no need to bend over backwards to stay friends.
Sounds like he is jealous to an extent, I mean you said he’s smart but then said he went to crappy schools, so he can’t be that smart. And when you don’t make lots of money, it’s natural to be jealous of those that do.
It’s funny cause I’ve had the opposite happen last couple of years, but meaning I got disgusted with some of my Wall Street friends accepting trump. Even though I’m rich and my views skew conservative, I was staunchly against trump as I view him as a combination of no morals / selfish / scam artist / racist / anti-conservative values. And I had a few friends go on and on about how awesome he was.
Rather than try to seek a common ground, I just distanced myself and slowly ghosted. I guess they thought since I normally aligned right, I would agree with them. But I find it’s best to just drift away, similar to ghosting a girl you went on dates with but don’t wanna see.
Maybe they will reach out again. One of the friends I mentioned above, did approach me at a bar we both happened to be at. He seemed to have really softened his stance on trump post the Jan 6th shenanigans, but I still found myself irritated and never really followed up. But people can change and maybe once your friend gets some life experience and realizes there are jerks in every industry and socio economic class and every political party, his views will mellow.
Stop stalking me trump lover.
What's the point of spending a week living with someone if all he's gonna do is act bitter or jealous? Find some new friends ASAP.
Don’t get me wrong, your friend sounds like a tool. But it also sounds like he brings up some good points about the nature of your job, and you can’t see past the school he went to or his political beliefs.
I think a lot of conservatives and liberals would scratch their heads when you ask them how prop trading benefits society. Also the fact that you unironically said “making Wall Street their ambition” is pretty cringe
First off, he is a very good friend, has been for years. I am also not saying I completely disagree with his view on the nature of my job, I also find it hard to speak to positives prop trading / hedge funds have in society. But it's more like this is still a large part of who I am at this point, and it isn't pleasant hearing it be associated with "disgusting" and "arrogant" by friends visiting me. I simply provide background on education and political views as I believe those contribute to the discussion. I have plenty of liberal friends that graduated with me who don’t express these thoughts strongly. You can call it cringe, but I don’t think many of us jumped through a lot of hoops to be where we are without that mindset.
Your friend sounds like a beta loser
Yea
Acting like any institution or business is perfect is honestly naive. There are a ton of valid criticisms about Wall Street. Wall Street rewards the end product ($$$) but places no differential on how one gets there. Those who lie, cheat, swindle, and steal will always get more and hence be rewarded more except for the rare person who does something so egregious or unbelievably stupid that they go to jail.
There’s also been a lot of fair criticisms after watching what happened in ‘08. Banks were bailed out to the tune of billions for making poor financial decisions, while your average Joe got left holding the bag. While some restrictions were placed post-crisis, the systemic problem of having corporations and banks that are too large to fail was never resolved (they should be broken up) and those who engaged in reckless decisions often got to exit with high compensation.
There’s a lot more that could be said here but study what exactly comprises of “synergies” and “efficiency”. When two large F500 companies merge, more often than not what comprises of synergies will hurt your average Joe (wage suppression, higher prices, lower product quality, less jobs, poorer working conditions).
Now of course not all of Wall Street is bad. There are many pockets that are essential for businesses to access capital, or for your average Joe to get their pension (pension funds), M&A deals that are accretive without hurting society (such as IP gains through acquiring a startup), etc. But there is bad and if you are talented and driven, you will be placed in several situations where you must decide between ethics and a higher total compensation (base+bonus). You have to acknowledge that and make your own personal decision on whether you will sell yourself and sear your conscience or refuse to hurt society and stick to your moral values.
the way to destroy Bernie people's image of self-righteousness is to point out that anyone making 35k+ a year is in the global top 1% of income earners. So basically Bernie people are a bunch of global one percenters complaining that the 0.01% exists.
Not a useful metric because you have to adjust for COL.
That is a ppp adjusted statistic
Lol who cares about people like that. All my friends root for my success. People who look down on me are avoided.
A lot of people are saying to ditch them, get better friends, etc. Personally I don't think this is the best course of action. I am of the opinion that a person's ethical and political beliefs don't fully define who they are, and it is possible (and often valuable) to have friends with significantly different moral views.
Here's an example from my own life. I have a cousin who is about my age. Both of us were only children, but we grew up around each other and spent a lot of time together. We attended different high schools and colleges, and during that time, he really leaned into the socialist / Marxist corner of the Internet. The whole 9 yards: billionaires should not exist, profit is theft, prices ought to be capped, etc etc. Obviously, he thinks that bankers, traders, and investors provide no value to society (in fact, negative value - they are stealing from deserving people and impeding societal progress).
No one here could ever convince me to ditch him, because he's like a brother to me. That said, I do have my own points of view on these issues that are very different from his. The way I deal with it is 1) realize that he's not trying to personally attack my points of view, he's just expressing his own point of view, 2) partially agree with him - his argument does have some merit, I didn't enter this field because I wanted to be altruistic or provide value to society, so I'm okay with the knowledge that maybe I'm not providing as much value as I potentially could, and 3) avoid trying to convince him that I'm right, because the truth is that I'm starting out with a different set of assumptions than he is, and even if my argument is perfectly reasoned out, it still rests on a set of incompatible assumptions.
I don't avoid discussion of the topics that we disagree on. But when they do come up, I find that this mindset helps keep things fun and civil instead of frustrating. Instead of approaching it as an argument, I think of it as just adding my own perspective to the discussion, with no expectation of him to agree with me.
If this still doesn't work for you and your friend keeps pushing it too far, just tell them that you'd like to change the subject since it seems that you'll never see eye to eye on it. If they can't respect that then they're not being a good friend, and there's nothing else you can do but stop talking to them for a while, I guess.
100% agree. Cutting off people with liberal viewpoints that you disagree with makes you no better than liberals who cut off people with conservative viewpoints they disagree with. No matter which way you look at it you're still a snowflake who is creating an echo chamber for yourself.
Dude is projecting his insecurities, it’s not your problem and don’t feel that it is. Friends grow apart. New ones will come.
Ditch him, you don't need broke friends
Start telling him how to do his job and when he says you don't know what you're talking about, tell him to keep an open mind.
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OP - as others have said, I think a lot depends on the context/how his comments have been expressed. On the one hand, someone constantly making petty/snide remarks about your career would be quite irritating I think personally - however equally you have to bear in mind that as a scientist/engineer he will likely be completely unfamiliar with finance/"Wall Street" aside from whatever superficial stuff he's seen on tv. So if he's just wondering out loud how bankers can make more money than engineers by "mysteriously pushing money around", that's a lot more understandable.
Myself I'm ex-IB now in PE, I have a couple of close college friends who are doctors - they also have very little idea of how the finance world works, and probably have the impression from watching tv shows/movies that it's guys in sharp suits trading billions of $ of other people's money every day before heading to the bar to crack open Dom P with a side of coke. I've tried to explain to them high-level what I do but a) they don't really get it, and b) more importantly they don't really care that much, as our friendship is about much more important things than our jobs. Equally I know high-level what speciality of medicine they are in and what setting they work in (clinic/hospital etc) but if they were going on about getting a super-prestigious job in a certain field/hospital, I would nod along without having a clue really.
So if your friend is in the latter category, I would really say cut him a break. As tbh he does have a point - he must wonder why he's getting paid less as a scientist/engineer than a bunch of prop traders who arguably don't add "value" to society. So if he's just expressing bewilderment about that I wouldn't get too hung up on it. But if he is snidely criticising your job (which is important to you) then I think that's unfair. That would be like me saying "I don't get how all these software engineers in Silicon Valley make $500k a year for sitting around drinking lattes and working only 30hrs a week, it's not fair" - when in reality I have no idea what I'm talking about, and just regurgitating some soundbite I heard or read in the news.
Who cares?
I would tell him to get on his high horse and ride to the nearest commune as I am sure that he is anti 5 star hotels and combaya with the other "my opinion is right so I can pontificate on everyone else who doesn't fit my narrative" Maybe i am old an jaded but I can not imagine insulting someone who offers me shelter who is supposedly my "friend"
As someone who studied mechanical engineering and was pretty damn good at it, I can shed some light. Because engineers are good at physics and get to throw around impressive sounding course names like multivariable calculus, thermodynamics, linear systems design, mechatronics, etc., engineers think they're really hot sh*t, which, to be fair, we are when it comes to physics. The problem is we think we can apply the same "logical" thinking to everything and end up acting as know-it-alls and that we have the answers for everything, simply because we can solve a force diagram. I was one of those kids once, and I grew out of it sophomore year, but there are plenty of engineers who never do and always view the rest of the professional world as intellectually and meaningfully inferior to their great pursuit of science. Especially as they graduate and realize they aren't going to be prototyping the next NASA spacecraft, but instead they'll be reworking the trigger on a black and decker drill so it matches this year's model. They double down and have to find reasons why everyone else is dumb. This also comes out when engineers are tasked with trying to understand anything about the humanities or political science.
If anything, I could argue that prop shops are value destructive to society as a whole. If you do high frequency market making then you’re really just a glorified, legal bookie; kind of a ridiculous role when stepping back and analyzing things. Not that the rest of finance is amazing, but there is a special place for prop trading. Anyways, I get it, you want to make a lot of money and you live in a society that enables it through this skillset, so go for it. Friend is simply jealous at the monetary rewards of your profession, it happens.
This thread is ga*y af and just like oulixeus said, what a beta loser. Dude probably looks like Karl Marx. I feel bad if you really had to walk around NYC with him... definitely no b*tch like Veronika Rajek checking you dudes out lmao. This is what sadly happens with liberal STEM friends when you're on the path to success in the business world, sorry about it.
I can’t be the only one who doesn’t run into this problem. All my friends from home are punky leftist artist types - in bands, bartending, making stuff, full socialists, etc. I can still catch up with them and talk about things besides work. All they know is I work a corporate job. I ask them what they’re up to lately, recent projects, and we just shoot the shit like back in the day.
Don’t waste time arguing with this guy. If he’s really your friend he wouldn’t act like this. It’s good to have non-finance friends. Find the ones who don’t need to agree with you on every issue.
In my experience with friends who lean left or are leftist, the problem is that they tend to be incredible intolerant to other viewpoints. A lot of the times these people also are the ones that still wear facemasks, think Fauci is a hero, think all people who supported trump are bigots and racists, think all wall street people are greedy predators that just want to pillage the little guy. I think this intolerance and even agressiveness aimed at people that don't agree with these leftist viewpoints has enhanced greatly in the recent years because of the media that kept hammering on about the dangers of the Maga crowd towards democracy, that dangers that are the non vaccinated etc.
In my view when Trump became president a lot of lefties lost their mind and still are suffering from TDS, I have friends and even when the name Trump comes up, they get upset instanly and start raising their voice. When Covid started the intolerence of people even questioning covid policy became unacceptable.
I think it has become very difficult to become/remain friends with leftist people at this point, because you have to avoid so much subjects because everything is politics almost when you talk about current news events, even if you discuss NY public safety or whatever. There seem to be no room for healthy discussion these days, people get worked up, raised voices.
My viewpoints are not even that hard right or something, a combination of conservative and libertarian.
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Not sure what kind of money you're making as compared to your so-called friend, but generally the solution is to buy a house or nice condo etc. before he does and then ask him what he thinks of it if/when you invite him over.
To your point about being accused of not putting up with pseudo-science on trading, I would've countered back to your friend with the following: You're an engineer right - you design and build things everyday? So you'd know if someone was BSing you? (His answer would be of course). Then ask him: So how would you feel if someone came up to you and said they'd designed a working car or plane by simply watching Youtube videos? Your friend will likely respond by saying hypothetical stranger is lying or full of s***
The moral of this exchange is that despite what is "value-add" to society, engineering and trading are both careers that people devote their lives to, and someone who went to college to study said profession, and works in said profession on a daily basis, is simply going to know more and be able to sniff out BS.
I always try to bring this thought when things like this happen:
Why am I friend with this person? is this friendship really honest, and doing me good, or is it based on the good things we had in the past?
If we need to think before we can say, or avoid saying certain things to our friends, maybe they are not really a friend for us.
And in this case, I would say he is just a colleague. And by this, if you really think you still want to see him once in a while, you can just ask him not to get into this conversation, and talk about other things on the rare moments you are together.
Not a professional advice, but more on a personal view on it.
You should be proud about your job, and the path you took to get there. And Able to talk about it with the people you like.
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