Editor’s note: This article was first published in March 2013; the pay, bonus and working-hours figures it cites reflect that time.
Working on Wall Street… living like the Wall Street guys is a dream coveted by a large part of the American population (and by some people outside the US). You would be at the centre of finance, taking part in some of the most important financial transactions in the world. And yes, you will earn far more than ordinary mortals, especially if you are good and do a good job.
Of course, it is not all perks and a passion for finance: there are certain drawbacks that a young person does not take into account when they think they have achieved their dream by becoming part of this select and exciting world.
A Wall Street veteran explains the dangers and sacrifices that come with working in this world. This person’s testimony was collected by Business Insider:
The main problem for someone who joins Wall Street is a distorted mindset about money. At 25 you will earn more money than all your friends, and they will envy you for it, but over time you may end up, in a way, envying some of the things other people have and you don’t.
1. You will work 80 hours a week
For the first five years, you will work an average of 80 hours a week, so forget about having a steady partner other than your latest-generation phone, which won’t let you rest even in your scarce free time. At first, the hours and being devoted to this job all day long won’t weigh on you, because you are living your dream, having landed a job that everyone dreams of and only you have managed to get.
The problem is that the days go by faster and faster, and the weeks feel shorter and shorter. Over time, you will grow more and more tired of being young and not being able to go out, or not feeling like meeting anyone for dinner outside a work meeting.
2. Your loved ones’ lives will go on without you
You will miss most family events. You probably won’t be able to go to your sister’s wedding or be with a relative in the last days of their life, especially if the markets are in turmoil. While it is happening, it weighs on you, but you manage to forget it by escaping into your work. Over time, though, that weight doesn’t go away, and you wish you could turn back the clock.
3. One day you will realise your achievements have no real value to society
You may make a company 3 billion dollars by buying and selling… They may give you a 300,000-dollar bonus for the year for the good job you have done, but when you are 40 and look back, you wonder where the work you have done actually shows.
A doctor has cured people, a researcher has discovered something that will benefit the public, a firefighter has saved, if nothing else, a cat, but our job was just to swap money around in bull and bear markets. Our successes come and go just like market trends. Most of your friends who chose to become doctors or teachers will have an impact on society. Your work will pass unnoticed once you stop doing it.
4. You will develop a distorted view of money
In one year you will probably earn more than your parents earned in their whole lives. That will lead you to lose touch with the reality of money: for you, spending 10,000 dollars in a weekend is something you can afford, because you will soon receive a 200,000-dollar bonus. Little by little, you will fall into the same financial mistakes everyone else makes, but on a grand scale. And that means you are no safer from bankruptcy than anyone else. I have seen Wall Street workers earn more than 1 million dollars a month for ten years, lose their jobs and find themselves bankrupt.
5. People start to stop envying you
When they see you walking down the street, well dressed in an expensive suit, with a luxury watch and a high-end car, and working on Wall Street, everyone will envy you. They would like to be like you, but it is hard when your own child tells you that when they grow up they don’t want to be like you. In fact, when people start dealing with you and see the kind of life we lead, devoted exclusively to money, they stop envying you and start to pity you.
6. You will be the “odd one out” among your acquaintances
If you are at dinner with a group of friends or acquaintances, you will hear their opinions about the crisis, about money… Ordinary people are not as up to speed on financial matters as you are, and they will say things that make no sense. At that moment you will feel uncomfortable being with people from outside your circle, and if you try to explain a concept to them, you could bore them beyond belief. In fact, it is hard even to explain what you do at work.
7. Bad habits will appear
On Wall Street we can’t afford to get sick. The constant stress workers are under leads many of them to start with a painkiller for a headache, a tranquilliser to sleep well after a hard day, a drink to ease the tension, and before many of them realise it, they are hooked on cocaine, above all because cocaine is a vice a Wall Street worker can afford in large quantities. You feel like a rock star, invincible, until you fail to notice that you are heading for rock bottom. If, when the time comes, you are fired, you will probably never get back on your feet.
8. When material things are no longer enough
Earning money working on Wall Street was your goal. Once you achieved it, you had the job you wanted and you were earning large amounts of money. You can buy anything you fancy, but there comes a point when you have already bought everything you wanted to buy. The moment you lose the passion that brought you to the Big Apple and money is no longer an incentive is when you start to ask yourself whether the daily stress, the sacrifice of your social life and not appreciating other, much simpler aspects of life are worth it.
At the end of the day, we live like rich people, but if you don’t have a plan to retire young and set up on your own, sooner or later you realise that you are just another slave to the system.
Further reading
- How to earn 1 million dollars an hour
- A tough job interview? You haven’t been interviewed on Wall Street
Featured image: Billie Grace Ward from New York, USA, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
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