"I am a 70 year-old banker. You are working for the wrong thing"
I am a retired banker in my 70s. I haven't worked for a while, but I know very well what the industry is like, and I now have time to reflect upon it.
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The problems in banking are the same as the problems in society at large, only magnified.
When you work in investment banking, you have very little time for anything else. Every day is a 12-hour day, at least, and if you're lucky you will have two half days at the weekend. If you're ill, you're expected to work. If your family is ill, you're expected to work. There are vacations, but they may be interrupted.
Why put yourself through this? It's called the hedonic treadmill.
I was born in the 1950s. At that time, life was a lot simpler than it is now. Far less was available, and we had fewer things we considered necessities. During my lifetime, a lot of former luxuries have become considered necessities.
As we work to afford these luxuries-necessities, work is consuming everything. Competition has become increasingly cut-throat, and employers are desperately squeezing employees in search of returns. In banking especially teams are often deliberately understaffed to maintain margins and late hours and facetime in the office are common.
Humans everywhere are suffering and bankers are suffering because they're at the pinnacle of this system. People can't keep up and are constantly dropping out and leaving the industry.
There are other ways of doing it. If you're an individual, don't keep turning necessities into luxuries. Accept little, work less. Read more and stop your brain atrophying. If you're an employer, show your employees some respect and treat them as humans instead of human resources.
Life is not about false necessities. Nor is it about squeezing people until they break.
You will understand that when you're my age. But you could learn it sooner.
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