Why does prestige matter?

I received an offer at WF for $53/h 1.5x overtime and am having trouble deciding whether to take that or another bank that is BB and has more "prestige" but pays less. I do not understand why I wouldn't choose the bank offering more money, maybe someone can explain to me why prestige matters more than how much you earn. 

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Prestige matters because NY employees can't know your past comp and won't believe you if you tell them. So the only "information" that can be passed across your career is prestige. Since there are far more people that want your job than seats, you need a lot of information in your favor to get a job. As such, prestige matters more than most other factors. 

That said, if you are a badass trader and you have a lot of PnL and somehow everybody on the street one day knows that then of course this is better. But in most cases, prestige matters a lot until it's clearer to others what your individual contribution is. 

 

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