3 ms·

I often recommend to young people just out of college that if they want to do serious intellectual work, their path ought to be: 1. Get a finance job on Wall S

I often recommend to young people just out of college that if they want to do serious intellectual work, their path ought to be: 1. Get a finance job on Wall Street. 2. Spend a few years saving up a decent nest egg of a couple million dollars. 3. Retire to the country side and start doing your intellectual work.

Xcelerate 8y ago
This is a fantastic path if you're able to do it. Most people have difficulty with steps #1 and #2 though. I still think the story of D.E. Shaw is pretty amusing. He got denied tenure at Columbia, so he started his own hedge fund, made billions, and then started his own research program doing what he really wanted to do in the first place.
heurist 8y ago
Pretty much my plan, except I'm not going to work in finance and it's going to take more than a few years... All I need, really, is enough to pay my mortgage for a few years.
crazynick4 8y ago
This is not as easy as it sounds. If it was, everyone would do it. A finance job on wall street does not guarantee you will become a millionaire in a few years. I worked for a few years in the finance department of a Wall St company and made decent money, even above average for someone out of college with a bachelor's (still not great for NYC), but if you want to make the millions you have to get with a very close-knit crowd of the dealers/brokers/market makers who are not open to letting in new people easily. And given the scandals and fraud which we read about in the news regularly, I can deduce at least one reason why. Just my n=1 but I knew a significant number of people who worked with me, even ones who were closer to the higher ups who still ended up with a nice but not extraordinary salary
ModernMech 8y ago
What if step one is a nonstarter? Wall street is not exactly a friendly environment for science types. And even if you manage to get a job like that, you're spending your time just making money for the sake of making money for some future of science. What if you never make it that far? Then you spent your life of Wall Street. If that's what you want, more power to you, but for a scientist that would be a sad way to ho.

Xcelerate 8y ago

This is a fantastic path if you're able to do it. Most people have difficulty with steps #1 and #2 though. I still think the story of D.E. Shaw is pretty amusing. He got denied tenure at Columbia, so he started his own hedge fund, made billions, and then started his own research program doing what he really wanted to do in the first place.

heurist 8y ago

Pretty much my plan, except I'm not going to work in finance and it's going to take more than a few years... All I need, really, is enough to pay my mortgage for a few years.

crazynick4 8y ago

This is not as easy as it sounds. If it was, everyone would do it. A finance job on wall street does not guarantee you will become a millionaire in a few years. I worked for a few years in the finance department of a Wall St company and made decent money, even above average for someone out of college with a bachelor's (still not great for NYC), but if you want to make the millions you have to get with a very close-knit crowd of the dealers/brokers/market makers who are not open to letting in new people easily. And given the scandals and fraud which we read about in the news regularly, I can deduce at least one reason why. Just my n=1 but I knew a significant number of people who worked with me, even ones who were closer to the higher ups who still ended up with a nice but not extraordinary salary

ModernMech 8y ago

What if step one is a nonstarter? Wall street is not exactly a friendly environment for science types. And even if you manage to get a job like that, you're spending your time just making money for the sake of making money for some future of science. What if you never make it that far? Then you spent your life of Wall Street. If that's what you want, more power to you, but for a scientist that would be a sad way to ho.