[busterarm]

I worked at a top 5 hedge fund in the early 2000s. They had a large team of E&Y auditors onsite at all times that I worked somewhat closely with.

Some things stuck out at me: - They were all in their early 20s. - They were all incredibly checked out. Honestly they still seem like an outlier to me decades later. - They partied hard. Yes, with drugs. - Most of them were in rotating intimate relationships with each other and unusually open about it. Office scuttlebutt was literally "who is fucking who this week". - They seemed busy for maybe two or three weeks out of the entire year and then it was long stretches of Minesweeper/Solitaire.

I filed this away in my head as "provides no value" and that was decades ago. If the industry itself is worse off today I can't imagine how much worse it actually is from my experience.

[jimnotgym]

I don't know about the partying, but they seem to work them very hard these days.