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Comment by rorrr2 | Hacker News Reader

I think you overestimate how much banking interns make. By a lot.

If you're a banking intern, it means you're a college kid. If you're in NYC, you can do something like live in NYU student housing for the summer. It's no big deal.

As an analyst, you'll be making over six figures, with a base in the $70-$80k range. You can live 20 minutes from midtown Manhattan on that, though you'll probably have to have roommates (but hey you're 22 so again, no big deal).

I think you're confusing interns and employees. I don't think banking interns make anywhere near $70-80K.

I worked as a technology intern at a large investment bank for one summer, and my salary was a prorated 80k. The IB kids were making about the same (although they worked many, many more hours than we did). This was 2 years ago.

N.B.: This was awful and I am now safely far, far away from the banking industry.

You know, if your base is $80k, and you're regularly working 100 hour weeks, your hourly wage rapidly approaches $16 / hour ... which is about what the fast food workers are currently striking for.

I do not think I could be coerced to work 100 hours a week regularly for less than $50/hour of cash and equity, and the lower bound might be closer to $100/hour.

You're not working 100 hour weeks consistently over the year. I'd be surprised if the yearly average is over 75 (in IB; I'd be surprised if it were over 60 in trading). Moreover, you don't take the job for the first-year salary. You take it for the potential of making $500k+ before 30 (if you stick it out), or going the MBA route and getting a cushy $200k 9-6 at some F500 afterward.

What is the success rate like? Do 100% of IB starters make it? 1%? 10%?

If you've got decent odds of hitting the big payoff, that's one thing, but if the expected value is low, it just becomes another lottery, with a few winners, a lot of losers, and a the winners enriching themselves at the expense of the losers.

Putting up with banking hours is all about the pay-off 7-10 years down the road.

If you can put up with the hours until you end up as a director or higher, you can pretty reliably makes over a million dollars per year (with continuous increases in salary) putting only 50-60 hrs a week.

People do banking because it's one of the lowest risk ways to becoming rich.

I'm interning down the road from where he was - I live 10 minutes away and still have money to burn.

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