We wonder if there is a direct relationship between the performance of investment banks and the public image of investment bankers. A few years ago, New York’s major publishing houses were fighting each other in a desperate bidding war for the rights to publish Dana Vachon’s Mergers & Acquisitions: A Love Story. (And, before the last financial crisis of this magnitude, Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby was narrated by a young man who came to New York to work in investment banking.) But now all the sad young literary men have turned against investment banking, regarding it as perhaps the lowest occupation available to educated people. Lower, even, than television writers.
Here’s a guy who actually wrote a novel called All The Sad Young Literary Men lamenting that many of his college friends never became anything that counts. Instead, they became investment bankers.
Even worse than the temporary psychological distortion is, as [Dean of Columbia Journalism School Nick] Lemann argued in “The Big Test,” the permanent sense of entitlement the admissions game provides. Winners can plausibly claim they participated in a brutal competition (even if many potential competitors were never told about it). So we owe no one anything. Many of the people I went to school with became doctors, public advocates, television writers who bring laughter to the American people. But most of them became, like my friend who believed that getting into Harvard was the hardest thing in life, investment bankers. We meritocrats have not, generally speaking, used our fantastic test-taking abilities to build a more equitable world. In fact, buoyed by a sense of the fairness of the process, we may have done the reverse.
Admission Impossible [New York Times]
The purpose of life is to build a more equitable world? Reality check for Ivy league liberals is always hard.
ivy leaguers talk the talk but NEVER walk the walk
Harvard investment bankers are actually better than all the Harvard management consultants. Those guys are real assholes.
Sounds to be like the best and brightest became Ibankers because they figured out early that the ratio of money earned to effort put in is much more favorable than any of the alternatives. Simple as that.
Ivy League LIBERALS? I agree. The Roman’s were LIBERAL when they changed the English language and created their own numbers in a LIBERAL way. For example, the number 4, a perfectly good number was changed by Roman LIBERALS to “IV” and then, the LIBERALS noticed that and called the number “eye vee” and made a perfectly good number sound like a plant. Of course, LIBERALS are plant huggers and want you to believe faulty science as ther is no ivy on the Antarctic icesheet the size of New England that just broke away from the Arctic Circle. So the media will never report that and thus are helping the terrorists. Shame on the LIBERALS. I am just as smart as you, Nomad, and together we’ll straighten this mess out.
I wonder how sweet of a book deal he got. I’d venture further that someone’s daddy at Harvard is the shmuck publishing it, given how poorly written this article was. Meritocracy indeed
The only reason Harvard is a stepping stone for doctors and PDs is because of the donations made by I-Banking alumni. Without their large endowment, Harvard would be as irrelevant as Brown.
Ibankers are pretty pathetic creatures, but mostly because they seem to be under the mistaken impression that being an excel monkey living off nothing but ego, narcissism, and seamlessweb is an acceptable substitute for being an actual human being. The ivy league education is really incidental in this case.
Dunno about all that. There’s something to be said about having a lot of money. It means options and freedom, being able to spend it on whatever or not spend it too. Which is an important contributor to happiness in this cold complicated world.
Both groups lack creativity and insight and laugh at their own bad jokes?
It’s a stepping stone for us twenty- and thirtysomethings who haven’t decided what we want to be when we grow up. A very, very lucrative stepping stone.
She should have gone into investment banking as he’s not going to cut if as a writer.
Ivy, no MBA
4 Bulge Firms
$3+ Million cash today, liquid.
It works
@12:52
you are way too easily impressed with yourself -
Nick Carraway was a bond trader not an investment banker. Get your shit straight carney, you’re the worst magazine editor..ooops…blogger, ever.
@12.52– you think 3 mill is a lot of money? It barely buys you an apartment in a nice building.
3m is more than most, if not all, of those socially enriching professionals would accumulate over the span of time the gentleman @12:52 spent in the BBs
and I think that was his point
This is insane. Maybe I should start a blog about getting into college rather than getting into i-banking…
come on give the guy a break (although could have been stated a bit more modestly). having $3m liquid at any point in life is pretty solid, especially if the guy/girl/whatever is still young. Lets not be too jaded her kiddies.
@ anal_yst — If 12.52 has 3 mill from working at 4 different firms, and is still young, his/her/its career ladder is truly odd.
To the bitter hater posts:
No need for a Shoebox $3m on UES/UWS with stroller/walker set. I own a weekend home in Westchester, and live in Soho as well.
Yes my path: analyst, assoc, VP, Director/MD took 4 firms….all bulge.
Stay at one firm and let them give 1-3yr gurantees away. See if i care.
I moved for the promotion/cash/guarantees; and hit highs of mid 90s, dot.com and ’06 too.
I lived it up too…probably blew $750K -$1M; dated some babes, drive an exotic $175K supercar, plenty of toys and swank threads, and partied all over world…no meatpacking district or bottle service/sharehouse nonsense.
Still young, late 30s. With basic compounding in SP500 I will have $5, 7, 10, 15 Million by age 40-60.
I could hit an insurance company and make $250K forever….while the multimillions work. $10 Million is a lot today and it will be a lot in 10 yrs too.
Yes, many made more but had less fun, lost more and will certainly have less after fat-wife’s lipo/minivan, divorce, addiction, busts, etc
As i said it works.
Good Luck and remember have fun!
that was fuckin inspiring. i feel like jumping out of bed, finishing my GED, going to interboro community college and follwing your lead to become a major player in the world of finance.
say Ty – how do you measure yourself? by height.
No wife, late 30s, talkin about yr bank balance and toys on DB? Sounds like you might have some issues. Ever see Family Guy? Ladies, would you date this guy?
The fact that you’re in your late 30′s and blogging your worth on DB proves you’re an insecure douche.
Calm down guys…I’m a lady and I’d date him. Why not? At least he doesn’t have more debt than cash, beats a lot of my potential boyfriends (I know a lot of actors/waiters – also people who went to Harvard…sigh)
How come all you people have time to read and comment when you all have real jobs?
@3:53 Tell us more. What are you looking for from this date? Anything more than dinner and freshly laundered sheets at the place in SoHo? How would you assess this guy?
Well see, in real life I come from the world of actors. Most of of the guys who want to take me out don’t even have freshly laundered sheets, and they live in Innwood….and dinner is dutch.
Assessing him?- hey he’s not in debt! I assume he doesn’t have to use credit cards to pay off his student loans (seriously – actors go to Harvard and Julliard and Yale etc. too but work as temps and waiters…- I have one friend who’s 45 and still hasn’t paid off his student loans from his MFA)
This guy seems like he’s practical – got guarantees after all. Is in it for the money. Why else work on Wall St? Not like you’re curing cancer or saving babies in Africa. He worked his way thru the system. Must be smart/conversational/charming. We girls like smart guys. He comes pre-screened, keeps getting promoted/hired. Lots of people must like him. That’s a better reference than Match.com And clean sheets.
sounds like you found your match! guarantees – wow, pre-screened – woah.
start saving for your kids college fund
@4:11 asked for an assessment… so I did…..anyway. one can’t date guys one meets on blogs…it’s not ladylike.
Lady@3:53,&@4:23
Any dude who brags about personal funds, toys, jobs, houses, and conquests on an annonymous site like DB has some issues.
He knows how to text message, hence all the short speak. So what?
The only credible part of the posting by that 30-something clown is his age.
Reduce his liquid holdings by about 95% and you’d be about right.
He’s probably talking about his boss’s boss, who he seriously admires and worships.
Bulge firm? The only bulge he knows is the bulge that he gets in his pants when he watches Cramer on TV.
Lady@3:53,@4:23…You’d be better off dating one of the friends you already know and trust than you would be experimenting with some unknown dick head who is trying to sound like a player.
@5:19 Suppose its all true. Do women really like players? I think not, despite all the trappings. Ladies, please comment. (I’m beginning to think that besides girl and bess and that other one, there are very few women here..)
Miss Actress says yes, but it sounds like she just wants a bit of a change from dirty sheets in Inwood, etc.
I love these sophisticated, annonymous pissing contests on DB, very classy…
I’m new to this blog. (found it during Bear thing) Didn’t think he was a player. Thought he was just a guy talking just like guys talk in bars…You mean everything people write here isn’t true? –miss actress
If that player was really living large the way he claims, he wouldn’t be bragging on DB. He wouldn’t care what others might think.
-The Guy from Delaware
Not ladylike to date someone you met on a blog? Since when? I’d rather date someone I thought was clever then dating someone based on his alleged bank account. Stay classy actress girl.
I’d rather date someone clever too…but those aren’t the guys I find….last single guy who asked me out is a carpenter – he is a friend. He has told me that he thinks capitalism is a bad idea. That there is no such thing as “wealth creation” and making a profit in a business means you’re abusing your employees or ripping someone off. So clearly I need to find guys that are a) not married b) clever ! — the guys here at least are funny….actress girl.
My simple dating rules: (1) guy must have a steady job, or a really impressive list of published book titles, with one book published within the last three years (living off royalties from his songbook is okay, too, as long as he knows where he’s going with the next recording); (2) guy must not be mired in debt; (3) guy must not be married; guy must not have substance abuse problems. Garden variety neuroses okay; overattachment to mother definitely a dealbreaker. Overattachment to past girlfriend with a fey name and endearing domestic hobbies is also a dealbreaker.
Guest@3:06AM….
Sounds like good advice for the young lady.
I must ask you this, though. Why are you sitting in front of your computer at 3AM giving dating advice on DB?
What happened to that player. How come he’s not talking trash again this morning?
@11:17 what did the guy say that was so funny? sure you dont have a feather up your ass?
Guest@5:19PM 04/01…
“Bulge firm? The only bulge that player knows is the bulge he gets in his pants when he watches Cramer on TV.”
Ha! Ha! What a great line. Wish I’d thought of it myself.
-The Guy from Delaware
@I am a dude — his whole post was funny. A seriously huge list of all the stuff he owns? (see 3:06) It was over the top. That made if funny. Funny that a guy would brag to this extent on a site. Whether it’s true or not.
But I also have a bunch of friends who have fat wives and divorces and lipo too. that part is funny because it’s true
But I meant all the rest of you are funny. And you are. witty and mean. and that’s funny.
Look, the world I live in is politically correct. But here?
. No need for feathers up anywhere….actress girl.