Young Money: Inside the Hidden World of Wall Street's Post-Crash Recruits is a New York Timesbestselling look at young Wall Street bankers after the crash of 2008.
I started writing the book in 2010, when I looked around at the recent college graduates who were starting jobs at big Wall Street banks just after the financial crisis. I was curious about how the crash had reshaped the experience of being young on Wall Street, and I wanted to figure out what happened to these people once they joined the money chase.
So for the next three years, I shadowed eight young workers at financial firms like Goldman Sachs and J.P. Morgan. They gave me intimate (and unauthorized) access to their lives both inside and outside of work, and taught me the secrets of the high-flying, soul-crushing world they inhabit.
Young Money is the story of these eight young bankers. It's a story about 100-hour workweeks, drug-fueled all-nighters, Harvard hedge funds, dating mixers, Occupy protests, and top-secret fraternity parties. But it's also about the doubt and introspection that creeped into the financial sector after 2008, and an inside look at how the crisis really, truly changed Wall Street, starting with its youngest members.
Kevin Roose is an author and journalist who currently writes for New York Magazine. His latest book is "Young Money: Inside the Hidden World of Wall Street's Post-Crash Recruits" (2014). As a student at Brown University, Roose made headlines in 2009 when he published his first book, "The Unlikely Disciple: A Sinner's Semester at America's Holiest University," which detailed his experience as a student spending a semester undercover at Liberty University, an evangelical Christian college founded by Jerry Falwell. Roose has also written about Wall Street and finance for The New York Times DealBook.
http://www.kevinroose.com/youngmoney/
Jon Stewart Interview
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Reviewers Say: Source
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Reviewers Say: Source
Roose takes us on a tour of a year in the life of several young bankers-- fresh out of college, top of their class. A fascinating account of how banks recruit these brilliant kids, then stick them on desks 24/7 to perform grueling, monotonous work. An insightful look at how the industry has changed since the financial crisis of 2008. A book as much about the economy as it is about the "quarter life crisis." Should these kids stay or get out altogether? Some make the leap to startup in Silicon Valley while others stick it out or get turned out by HR. The best book to come out of this world since Michael Lewis's Liars Poker. Highly readable and totally character driven. This could make for a great television show or movie about these bright PYTs
And This One
"For three years New York’s Kevin Roose followed the careers of eight young Wall Street workers to research Young Money. Released last month, the book is many things: a look at the culture of Wall Street through the eyes of those at the bottom, an exploration into the decline of the industry’s esteem, and an 8 person character study. It isn’t however a new Liar’s Poker.
It is a lazy cliché to compare any book remotely critical of Wall Street to Michael Lewis’ 1989 classic. Poker tells the story of an industry on crazy pills and absolutely shreds it. After majoring in Art History, Lewis get a job at Salomon Brothers and found himself handing out investment advice to seasoned investors despite not knowing a thing about the financial industry. “The whole thing still strikes me as preposterous,” he later wrote in a pseudo-epilogue.
I don’t think Roose set out to write the next Liar’s Poker. If he did he would have spent more time analyzing how the industry’s incentive structure turns good people into amoral technocrats 1 He also would have called out the superficiality of many of the young analyst’s statements 2. Instead he crafted a narrative around the psychological impact of working in a toxic industry. “I have never seen more people disgusted to get their hands dirty in my entire life,” a young analyst told Roose after her Bank of America class was tasked with doing routine yard work for a few charities. “There were like two hundred kids just standing there, looking at their BlackBerrys and being like, ‘I really want to get back to the office.’ I was like, ‘Are you guys kidding me? Is this a joke? You’re out in the sun, doing something good for the community, and all you guys want to do is go back and sit at your desks?’”
That’s Wall Street culture in a nutshell. Given the chance to stay outside and help the community, they’d rather get back to their desks.
Bottom Line: Young Money does not offer an in-depth description of the financial services industry or a grand explanation for its failings. Rather, it is a light and breezy look at the impact of the finance culture on the lives of eight young people. "
It is a lazy cliché to compare any book remotely critical of Wall Street to Michael Lewis’ 1989 classic. Poker tells the story of an industry on crazy pills and absolutely shreds it. After majoring in Art History, Lewis get a job at Salomon Brothers and found himself handing out investment advice to seasoned investors despite not knowing a thing about the financial industry. “The whole thing still strikes me as preposterous,” he later wrote in a pseudo-epilogue.
I don’t think Roose set out to write the next Liar’s Poker. If he did he would have spent more time analyzing how the industry’s incentive structure turns good people into amoral technocrats 1 He also would have called out the superficiality of many of the young analyst’s statements 2. Instead he crafted a narrative around the psychological impact of working in a toxic industry. “I have never seen more people disgusted to get their hands dirty in my entire life,” a young analyst told Roose after her Bank of America class was tasked with doing routine yard work for a few charities. “There were like two hundred kids just standing there, looking at their BlackBerrys and being like, ‘I really want to get back to the office.’ I was like, ‘Are you guys kidding me? Is this a joke? You’re out in the sun, doing something good for the community, and all you guys want to do is go back and sit at your desks?’”
That’s Wall Street culture in a nutshell. Given the chance to stay outside and help the community, they’d rather get back to their desks.
Bottom Line: Young Money does not offer an in-depth description of the financial services industry or a grand explanation for its failings. Rather, it is a light and breezy look at the impact of the finance culture on the lives of eight young people. "
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