Damn, It Feels Good To Be a Banker

by Leveraged Sellout

  When new Analysts or employees are introduced, their undergraduate institution is without a doubt their main point of distinction. And from this one simple fact, I’m able to deduce a wealth of information about the person in question.

  Top Tier

  Princeton

  School Slogan: “Princeton—We Bringin’ Banker Back.”

  In This Side of Paradise, F. Scott Fitzgerald said of my alma mater, “I think of Princeton as being lazy and good-looking and aristocratic.” He got two out of three—Princetonians aren’t lazy. On the contrary, Tigers work furiously and diligently to ensure their top spots on Wall Street. I imagine F. Scott couldn’t make it past first-round Banking interviews and, in his bitterness, made some blanket generalizations.

  In my less biased opinion, I think of Princeton as being the consummate Banker school. Elitism, scholarship only for the sake of monetary gain, and a work-hard/ball-hard philosophy are the very bricks that bolster this institution. It brings a tear to my eye just thinking about it.

  At the center of the university’s social system is a set of upperclassmen eating clubs where students take meals and do beer slides on eighteenth-century mahogany floors. Engineered into this system is an exclusivity that actively prepares students for the careers they are about to embark upon. Hell, the eating clubs are even all neatly lined up in a row on what is known as The Street.

  Bicker, which the best eating clubs subscribe to, is Princeton’s polished version of fraternity rush. There are also clubs that don’t believe in this process and allow potential members to just “sign in.” Intuitively, the Bicker clubs are the Bulge Bracket of The Street and the non-Bicker eating clubs are insignificant. Imagine how effectively a Bank would run if you could just sign your name and become an employee—they’d be as broke as non-Bicker club girls.

  But the most compelling part about Princeton is that everyone, regardless of social standing, major, or aspiration, ends up in Banking after graduation, even if it’s only for a short spell. Other Ivy League schools go through the motions of offering students postcollegiate opportunities beyond finance, but Princeton appropriately says “fuck that,” and rarely lets anyone other than Banks recruit on campus. It’s no wonder we’ve held the number-one spot in U.S. News & World Report for the past four years.

  At Princeton, there’s even a special yearly event known as Reunion. It occurs during graduation, when thousands of alumni come back to campus to party, wear orange, and make sure that if somehow, someone didn’t manage to land a job in finance, they can finally get a job in “the family business.”

  Harvard

  School Slogan: “Harvard—With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility.”

  Meeting someone from Harvard, they will undoubtedly display faux modesty and say something along the lines of, “Oh, I went to school in Boston.” I imagine they want me to guess MIT, just so they can say “Harvard” proudly in response, but instead, I say something like, “Hmm. You really look like a Northeastern kind of guy. BU, maybe?” This puts them in their place, and they will scramble away, crying crimson tears all over the floor.

  But, to their credit, Harvard’s name universally carries the most prestige. That’s why people “ooh” and “aah” even when someone’s second cousin ends up at Harvard podiatry school, and that’s why Banks like having Harvard kids on their desks.

  Harvard has its own set of exclusive upperclassmen clubs known as final clubs, but they’re much more focused on politics, erudition, and pomp than on facilitating careers as millionaires. In fact, there is a legend about the Porcillian Club, known as one of the most exclusive clubs (along with A.D.), that says, “If members of the Porcillian do not earn their first million before they turn thirty, the club will give it to them.” To which I say: “If you haven’t made your first million by the time you’re thirty, you should fucking kill yourself.” One can only hope they have begun to account for inflation.

  The thing about Harvard is that it’s perpetually trying to give students the impression that they’re destined for something better, more glamorous, or more creative than finance. One look at 02138 (their zip code, how 90210), a magazine geared toward Harvard alumni, and it’s obvious that the university is trying to sell students on the notion that they could and should be the next Natalie Portman, John Roberts, or a writer for The Simpsons.

  But in the broader scheme of things, these people are just entertainers and counsel in the grand court of life. Who wants to be a jester when he could be more like another Harvard alumnus, Lloyd Blankfein (CEO of Goldman Sachs), and be The King?

  Wharton

  School Slogan: “Wharton—University of Pennsylvania”

  Based on their curriculum, I originally had Wharton slotted in the Vocational Banker Schools section below, but some stubborn fact-checker at my publisher made a huge fuss and cited various “facts” to prove that Wharton was indeed a Top-Tier Banker school. Not coincidentally, the fact-checker happened to be a Wharton alum. Figures.

  I’ll concede that a lot of prestigious Bankers do come from Wharton. But the fact that it is attached to the University of Pennsylvania is Wharton’s biggest and most tragic downfall. In and of itself, Wharton is a fairly exclusive place, but the nature of its being lumped together with a big, ugly mass of mediocrity creates insecure, overcompensating alumni. As a result, you will never hear a Wharton grad admit he went to UPenn. Even if he snuck in through the back door to Wharton after his second year, he will undeniably declare “Wharton” when he meets you, like a leper proudly extending his one good finger to shake. I see the rest of your disfigured hand, buddy, and it’s revolting.

  Second (Chip on My Shoulder) Tier

  Stanford

  School Slogan: “Stanford—West Sell Side 4 Life!”

  Stanford is a school on the non Banker side of the States that’s full of jocks, hippies, and programmers who fancy themselves “entrepreneurs.” Eek. The only reason Stanford appears on this list is because its sheer size ensures that a certain percentage of students end up in finance. For the most part, though, these kids end up in the satellite offices (see “Fact #12—It’s all Jersey to me” for additional detail), Boutique Banks by the Bay struggling for business, or interning at floundering VC firms.

  Stanford, here’s a piece of advice: if you want to increase the prestige of your school, funnel some of the massive funds you spend on athletes to provide scholarships to potential Bankers. Wait…actually, no future Banker comes from a family that needs money that desperately. Well, at least you’ve got Michelle Wie.

  Yale

  School Slogan: “Yale—Overvalued.”

  Yale is frequently considered among the ranks of Princeton and Harvard but should not be. Yale is indeed an academically pedigreed school with a set of deliciously elite secret societies, but instead of concentrating their efforts on joining the ranks of high finance, something causes Elis to focus on careers in civil service, legislation, and thespianism. It’s difficult to imagine what would compel someone thusly—perhaps they yearn to return to the squalor they experienced in New Haven?

  Anyway, Yale does produce a few Bankers a year, but the closest it gets to the glamour of Wall Street is via the investments of its large endowment, run by David Swensen, a University of Wisconsin–River Falls graduate (ouch…risky!).

  Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)

  School Slogan: “Small. Yellow. Different.”

  I don’t know much about MIT except that it is the world’s foremost nerd kibbutz. Students band together under the premise that looks, fashion, pop-culture knowledge, and hygiene should take a backseat to Integrated Circuits. This lasts for three years, until all the computer science, math, and physics geeks get to senior year and realize they need to figure out how to fund the skyrocketing cost of their World of Warcraft addictions—a lifestyle the salary of a lowly engineer can no longer support.

  As such, many MIT students figure they’ll apply their in-depth knowledge of signal processing a
nd algebraic topology to go into finance and be quants. Some students are able to get these positions, but many others end up realizing they’re not quite as “quant” as they originally thought and end up in generalist positions. They often consider themselves superior to other Bankers because of their loose understanding of neural networks and Fourier space, but their preconceived notions about their intelligence are, appropriately, artificial. That kind of knowledge actually tends to hinder a true Banker more than help him.

  Third (Shit) Tier

  Cornell

  School Slogan: “Cornell—Mediocrity Delivered.”

  Most people don’t realize that three out of the seven of Cornell’s undergraduate schools are publicly funded, but most people do realize that all seven are lucky to have been part of whatever blunder placed them in the Ivy League. Cornell produces top “scholars” in two things: agriculture and hoteling; everyone else is stoked on whatever finance job or gorge they’re lucky enough to land in.

  Dartmouth

  School Slogan: “Dartmouth—Keystone Light Meets Finance Light.”

  I imagine the dumbest, hokeyest, frattiest kids from Princeton hidden away in the mountains of New Hampshire, and I see Dartmouth. They have secret societies, but their names are things like Sphinx and Dragon, which sound more like creatures out of Magic: The Gathering than any social network that’s worth being tapped into.

  One would think that being so painfully isolated, “dudes” would study hard to try and get jobs in finance so they could move into civilization. But instead, they opt to float down the Connecticut River on oversized inner tubes (Tubestock—not a lie) and hit on ugly chicks who are way too into ice hockey.

  Duke

  School Slogan: “Duke—Down Here, Guys!”

  Duke is prime evidence to the fact that merely being affluent and white in America can no longer thrust one into the upper echelons of the finance industry. Sadly for the Blue Devils, competition now demands that one also be intelligent.

  Just like Duke is almost an Ivy League and its students almost made the top 5 percent of their class, Duke Bankers can almost make it into the most elite PE firms or Hedge Funds, but fail. What a heartbreaking existence of perpetual slightly above-averageness.*

  Vocational Banker Schools

  In many public high schools, I’ve heard that there is a group of kids who leave in the middle of the day to go study vocational arts such as plumbing, HVAC, and cosmetology. The kids who go to Vocational Banker Schools also miss real school to learn something you’re meant to learn on the job, except they pay about $200k because they think it’ll help them get into the industry. At least the students who study plumbing learn hard skills and gain connections to a union; all Vocational Banker School graduates have to show for their efforts is a Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) degree, which no one has heard of or cares about at all.

  New York University (Stern School of Business)

  School Slogan: “NYU—Bright Lights, No Future.”

  You’d think that being situated in New York City, the epicenter of finance, NYU would be a great Banker institution. Proximity suggests that countless finance gods would claim NYU as their alma mater and that the school would easily feed its graduates into the top spots on Wall Street. That’s just the kind of illogical thinking Stern relies on to stay afloat.

  Sadly, the few NYU grads who do make it onto The Street deal with their school like a horrible one-night stand, wiping it from their memories. While recruiting, they will treat Stern candidates like illegitimate offspring, suddenly becoming awkward and saying: “It isn’t mine.”

  University of Michigan (Ross School of Business)

  School Slogan: “Ross: Dress for Less.”

  The Ross School of Business was founded at the University of Michigan (one of “the nation’s top state schools,” whatever that means) by Stephen Ross, a real-estate developer. I can’t help but find this odd—like a nurse opening up a med school. The few UMich kids who do finagle their way onto The Street demonstrate a similar level of grooming—their brains are overloaded with trivial facts and formulas, but they never quite grasp the overarching concepts that matter.

  Carnegie Mellon University (Tepper School of Business)

  School Slogan: “CMU—Nerdy, Yet Dumb.”

  CMU is on this list because not only is its business school in the shadow of Wharton, its engineering school is in the shadow of MIT—a double whammy of rejection that creates a student body with supremely low self-esteem. What ends up happening in this situation is that the engineering nerds take whatever few finance jobs are available at CMU and the Tepper School of Business kids are left with the ever-shameful IT consulting.

  Indiana University (Kelley School of Business)

  School Slogan: “Indiana—Banker from the Breadbasket.”

  How the fuck did this get on the list?

  Other schools Bankers might come from: Vanderbilt, Tufts, UVA, Columbia.

  Non-Banker Schools

  There are also many categorically non-Banker universities. Like financial aid, I only really know about these schools through hearsay and folklore, so I can’t be 100 percent certain they even exist. Let’s hope they do not.

  Swarthmore / Oberlin / Haverford / Carleton

  School Slogan: “”

  There are many schools across the country that are part of a network known as the “small liberal arts schools.” I believe you end up at one of these places when you can’t pass Calculus and vaguely understand but are still obsessed with Milan Kundera. Know one thing though—when someone says to you: “I went to a small, liberal arts school,” that means “I make $40k a year, gross.” Gross.

  Brown

  School Slogan: “What Can Brown Do for You? Nothing.”

  At Brown, grades and GPAs are optional. At Banks, Brown graduates are not only “optional” but “highly discouraged.” I did meet someone from Brown once, and he told me how their classes were “Satisfactory/No Credit”–based. I thereby assigned him and everyone else from Brown “No Credit” for life.

  Business Schools

  Harvard Business School

  School Slogan: “HBS—Nothing Else Matters.”

  There is officially only one proper Banker business school: HBS (Harvard Business School). Supposedly, other institutions do hand out MBAs, but they are not even worth being acknowledged.

  International Schools

  While the rest of the world struggles to keep up with the United States in terms of cultural and political development, their universities lag even farther behind. I attribute this largely to the concept of public higher education systems, which, by giving opportunity to poor people, essentially strips a university of all its Banker potential.

  The United Kingdom comes close with Oxford, Cambridge, and the London School of Economics (which sounds elite purely based on the use of the word Economics). Canada, as expected, has nothing to offer. The Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) might actually be leading this pack with its notoriously genius graduates who can conjure fire out of thin air and program computers to cure AIDS. We don’t really like them in Banking though, as these skills have more utility back in the Third World.

  FACT #6

  You’re just not the right fit for us.

  Selection

  MILLIONS OF PEOPLE try to land jobs in Banking every year, hoping to get their paws on the immeasurable rewards that the business offers. As such, financial institutions must implement extremely rigorous recruitment processes to ensure that the brightest minds are lured in and the garbage is kept out of sniffing distance.

  I went back to school for on-campus recruiting this year. It was hard to imagine that I could feel any cooler than when I was a student, but as an alumnus working at a Bulge-Bracket Bank, I did.

  I felt a rush as soon as I stepped into our auditorium and saw hundreds of students buzzing around, trying eagerly to grab the attention of anyone in finance. They ran around like chickens with
their heads cut off, regurgitating the same slew of questions to anyone who would listen. I took my post behind our table and spoke with an enthusiastic but aloof candor.

  “What’s the work/life balance like in Banking?” I’d be asked.

  Immediately and sternly I would respond: “The consulting firms are in the back.”

  “How does your Bank compare to the others?”

  “We’re better. Here, take a water bottle.” And, laden with paraphernalia and pamphlets, the young sycophants would either scurry along or loiter by our table hoping we might let some insider information slip.

  Girls came by the booth, and they were starry-eyed. I suspect many weren’t even interested in finance but just hoping to bathe for a second in our presence. They received both a water bottle and my business card, just in case they “had any questions.”

  The Lure

  I had to be courteous to everyone, regardless of qualifications, but I didn’t particularly feel bad about instilling false hopes; that’s what we do. We entice students from all backgrounds to apply so we have the lowest acceptance rates, even if that means my spending five minutes humoring some dumb Spanish major who doesn’t have a chance in hell.

  Someone in East Asian Studies came by the table for information and, unsolicited, started to describe how learning Chinese was extremely “analytical” and applicable to finance. I tried to see the connection for a minute, and then I just started picturing this guy with a half-bald head and ponytail doing a discounted cash flow analysis with a huge paintbrush, ink, and a scroll out of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

  The Hose

  Résumés and Cover Letters

  After we get everyone on campus to apply, we filter for only the highest-quality candidates. This process consists of reviewing résumés and cover letters and then conducting a set of interviews, which leaves the majority of applicants with nothing but an unrealized dream and a Bank-branded Nalgene—a lifelong reminder of just how great things could have been.