Is low income considered diversity?

No, but the black kid that summers in Sagaponack will get the invite to all the early processes. Maybe you can ask him how they went?

So weird that the US doesn't have this. In the UK most diversity efforts actually happen from the outside-in i.e. diversity organisations like SEO London, upreach, the brokerage, and Rare partner with banks/other firms. 3 out of 4 of the orgs I just mentioned work low socioeconomic background and first gen students as well as ethnically diverse students. Strange that even the US version of SEO doesn't adopt this.

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There's a long history of Wall Street hiring poor kids, although most of this was done by the scrappier firms and I think mostly for S&T. IB has always been a more white-shoe role.

Such is the issue with diversity engineering. It isn’t really about diversity of anything relevant. It’s about HR engineering the race of the firm to give the appearance of fairness or “equity” or any other ridiculous thing they claim. Best of luck to you

There are some programs if you are first gen, just not as many as diversity. Moelis for sure has a virtual program that includes that. Look harder.

You can highlight this on your resume and people will pull hard for a scrappy kid. For example, are you first gen? Put that on your resume (just small/parentheses) and in your intro networking emails too. Did you work full time during school and/or pay for college yourself? Put that on there too. If you're on a full-ride, emphasize that. 

Work hard and have a chip on your shoulder, but being bitter about what other people get is not the way and you have to come off as a positive grinder in recruiting, not angry about the way the world is. Be EXTREMELY humble.

Chips on the shoulder put chips in the pocket. Grind on. 

I’ve worked with enough senior people (including Bear) who are known and vocally from poor background. Bank heads who were first to go to college, vice chairman first in family to get out of some valley, immigrants. Could be white, could be minority. I am a pell grant guy. You’ll be fine if you are good. Finance is full of them. 

It sure as hell should be. Just thinking about colleges and affirmative action, SAT / ACT scores are highly correlated with household income. Sure, there may be a disproportionate number of minorities within that group, but the head start that wealth provides a child in their upbringing dwarfs any other environmental factor

Like others said, unfortunately no, but it should be. 

Diversity means black and nothing else. Every other group gets screwed so one group can win

Low income should be the only diversity initiative.

Current initiatives will see firms preferentially hire minorities from educated and affluent households, (just the nature of talent pools at elite universities), which in my opinion completely disregards what diverse hiring should be about.

Does hiring a black candidate whose dad’s a lawyer and mom’s a doctor really push the envelope diversity-wise for your firm? I’d argue not. But hiring a first-gen college student from a dirt-poor family in West Virginia, or a first-gen Laos-American student whose family immigrated here with nothing will do much more to introduce diverse thought and backgrounds into companies.

Companies don’t care about actually promoting diversity, it’s all a self-congratulatory PR hack job.

This one doesn’t sit well with me. Worsens the issues related to prejudice / stigma / divide if such a program is widely marketed and colleagues start pointing fingers. 
“How did that kid get hired even?”

”He poor.”

”aaaah.”

Do you ever wonder why affirmative action for college isn't done on a socio-economic basis?  Most elite privates could easily cover the cost of letting like 10-20% of their incoming student body not pay anything but they don't.  The reason is if you sort by socio-economic status, it really helps a lot of the poorer Asian groups (e.g. Vietnamese, Burmese,, Laotian,...etc) and whites while making the racial disparity of campus worse.

Sorting by socieconomic status lets the wrong type of minorities in.