PE fucking SUCKS. The human brain was not meant to be hunched over on a computer until 2am everyday doing pointless fucking analysis for one big debt bubble of overlevered “mission critical” garbage businesses who will have no higher exit later. This is the furthest thing from fast-paced cool mega acquisitions!!! You’re literally a high paid secretary, process lawyer, FP&A bitch, and every other trivial task professional combined. I’m dying. I barely see my friends. My group is sociopaths who demand and create work just to feel superior. I have no romantic relationships besides getting blacked out every weekend to cope with the pain. This is abysmal. Don’t let a slow summer and July 4th weekend distract you from the fact that once summer is over you will be miserable again. I hate this job so much. Thank god I’m going to B-school next year Jesus Christ PE is a nightmare.
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Agreed man. I am genuinely worse off here compared to banking where I atleast would shoot the shit in the bullpen and be more social. Everyone staying up late together is way better than being alone.
Remember this feeling when you go to bschool… most of your peers will find themselves desperately recruiting to get back into the industry after one summer internship at a startup when they realize they can’t accept that they paid $300K and lost 2 years of income to take a paycut.
PE at a junior level is literally just banking with a paycut and less comraderie because you're surrounded by hardos who self-selected into PE post-IB instead of doing something meaningful with their life.
So real. Will be the 3rd year ina row working on Independence Day for this chump right here.
This job is hell on earth. I am at the point where I would do literally anything else and I genuinely believe I’d be happier. No one ever seems happy that I work with. Everyone here is such a fkn loser, including myself.
The delusion that PE is this cool prestigious job needs to stop. This is basically the same as ever other shitty corporate job in America, just dialed up to 11. Oh how I wish I did basically anything but this
So quit
I feel like all professional services job + PE are basically just compensated as [Average Pay of Alumni of Institution] * (Hours worked in IB/PE/Consulting / Hours worked in Average Job).
The market is fully efficient and you are just trading in health/time for a multiple of hours/average hours.
Back in the days you could really say that finance paid outlandish. Just take a look at the Lehman leaks, I mean goddamit. That was a time when avg. rent / flat was probably like 1/3 it is today and a restaurant visit cost you less than half and those guys were earning MORE than ppl. in finance today.
It just does not make sense.
+1 to the fully efficient market comment, we're witnessing the market correct for tech in real time too
Maybe other parts of tech, not AI
eh, pay is still really high in tech, just seeing more layoffs is all
The market is fully efficient lol
This answer should be posted on every WSO thread when someone complains about working on Wall Street. Perfect answer.
None of the work is value add.
Idk making high six figures with mms in carry sounds like a pretty sweet deal to me.
No one's going to fall for your dangling the gold carrot tricks, VP.
I feel like this is a bait lol, but I’ll take it.
High six figure comp will not be achieved until you are deep into the VP / principal role, and there is a TON of attrition prior to that. Most associates will not get this far. Also, this implies you have grinded through multiple years of banking, multiple years of associate, and probably 1-2 years of VP / principal as well. That is the BEST case for the average person and your be kidding yourself if don’t think you have to give up a meaningful amount of physical health, relationship, and mental well being points to do so.
Also, carry is a joke. The biggest scam of them all. Okay great - you get a very small allocation as an associate, and it picks up from there, BUT - to actually realize the carry a lot of things have to happen that are far outside your control. It can take gd forever for a fund to close. Some funds won’t hit their hurdle. Most people won’t last long enough to actually realize the full amount. The list goes on. Who do actually know who has received a single dollar of carry that isn’t partner level? And even if you are a Partner, you play the waiting game for your big carry funds to play out, which again, takes a long time.
All fair I’m a senior vp so yes I didn’t hit 800 until 4th vp year. I can’t reveal too many specifics on carry without giving myself away potentially but let’s just say we lucked out with our portfolio mix. But you’re right it’s not the median outcome even for those who have survived this long.
Oh and on physical and mental health I’m in better shape than in college and my hairline hasn’t budged.
SoUnDs LiKe a SwEeT DeAl Bro 😎
Who doesn’t want a slightly nicer apartment in the city and hitting the same speakeasy’s every weekend for $500 and a one night stand 😎
Very fulfilling life champ
Idk about you put 800k pa plus mms in carry plus mms in savings that are accreting gets you a lot more than the above. But if you’re fine with mediocrity in a t2 city being a suburban father like everyone, by all means.
Carry is a joke. Youd be better off working at CVX or GE or fucking Pfizer and collecting a damn pension at 55 w/health insurance. Worth more and much more reliable.
Does anyone have an opposite, compelling anecdote / take?
corporate is miserable working 9-5 on boring work and it’s so slow the days go by very slowly. Also, huge 50% pay cut and also I’d rather be doing deals until 11pm Anwyays since my evenings when I get home I just have to spend cooking and washing dishes instead now. I’d much rather be learning over watching TV shows or going on social media
Agree. Starting a business sounds like the way to go
Then learn stuff and don’t watch tv shows or go on social media?? Hahhaha bro
Sucks
Lol, way to tell us all you have no friends. Life isn't a false binary.
Is it genuinely this bad? Looking to maybe work my everloving ass off in college to get to this point, but the more I read the more stories I hear similar to this one…
It was worth the suck the last ten years. Now it's a dead asset class.
Any asset classes that you’d suggest I give a look as alternatives? Was sort of drawn to PE as it seemed like the job (in simplistic terms) was basically flipping/optimizing businesses and getting to dive into the financials of a wide variety of industries. The large salaries didn’t hurt, but I was under the impression that this work is worlds more interesting than something like IB?
We are headed to an era where the sell-side may become more desirable than these dead asset classes on the buy-side.
Sell-side also has better culture and camaraderie!
(1) Yes, reality is different than what you read in Barbarians at the Gate.
(2) Everyone is miserable but it is a racket, so they just keep on looking for the greater fool.
Anyone have stats on PE fundraising this year? With smaller funds, are sponsors essentially stuck with no exits for mediocre assets?
This thread makes me so happy I left this industry
Where did you go? Haven’t even hit the desk yet and already feeling this won’t be for me
Recently left an HF to become an FP&A bitch in tech and it’s so fun dude. Far lower upside but better guaranteed money and I can go grab drinks at lunch, work remotely for large portions of the day, etc.
Yeah FP&A is pretty chill. I could have retired in that role making decent money, but left as it wasn't that challenging and wanted more money... now I kind of wish I didn't leave - I had it easy.
Wow… se nota que estás cargando con muchísimo. Y aunque suene intenso, no estás solo en esto —muchas personas sienten ese mismo vacío en ambientes laborales donde todo gira alrededor del rendimiento y no del bienestar. Es agotador tratar de mantener una fachada profesional mientras por dentro te estás desmoronando.
are you a colombian prostie trying to get DMs?
because otherwise what the fuck is this
heard that quitting makes your balls grow in size by +38.7%
do what u want with this info
Couldn’t agree more. PE is prestige-wrapped misery.
Left a solid real estate development role for REPE, thinking I was leveling up. Instead, I landed in a corporate prison where my days revolved around fixing slide layouts, tweaking Excel tabs, and feeding the insecurities of overpaid directors.
12-hour days, no sunlight, zero flexibility. No strategy, no ownership — just grunt work repackaged as “impact.”
Three months in, I felt miserable, had grey hairs, anxiety, shrinking balls, and a hormonal profile that looked like a dying plant.
So I quit. No backup plan. Just knew I had to get back to real estate development — real work, real people, real life.
If fine-tuning PowerPoints and Excel models to please insecure managers feels like a win, PE’s all yours.
Burnout in a suit is still burnout.
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