Career in Finance

Anyone else here studying economics at a target uni and cringing with every new post from Josh Burns and Raja12? The way they speak, you can tell they know nothing about what uni and the IB industry is like, going on about how much money they're gonna make 😅.

I'm all for people asking interesting questions about future careers on these forums but their posts scream wannabe yuppies. I wonder what their reactions will be like when they fail their first numerical or psychometric test for a summer internship application. Or if they actually make it into BB IB and then their MD treats them like an animal and they realise their life is now excel formulas and PowerPoint slides.

Thats why Im asking these questions init so I can know what its actually like

I get that side of it that's why I'm still like double guessing if I even wanna go into the finance career

You are focusing on the nuances too much though mate. Take it from me, I’ve done my degree n now doing masters and I was in a fairly similar mindset to u at ur age. Forget about wanting to earn big money and having a family and **** - you’re in year 13. Honestly just do a degree you want to do and decide what career you want to do when it actually matters. You’ll realise that it matters little about what degree you take for IB and more about your preparation for actual applications and your degree grades and industry experiences. Whatever you do across any industry, probably unless you’re in a boutique small place, you’ll be working long hours and doing not much hands on practical ****. Your approach to dentistry is also pretty naive, just thinking you’ll have a cushty life earning decent money taking it easy with a guaranteed dentists job out of uni, probably take u far longer to earn good money etc doing that than working in finance. One final point, IB is not the be all and end all of well paid finance. There’s hundreds of asset managers, trading houses, energy companies, boutiques, bb, commercial banks... the list is endless.

Hello everyone. I know you guys have a lot of extra things to worry about but if you could take a minute or two to answer my queries it will help me out massively. I am currently a year 13 student who is stuck between doing Dentistry and Economics at Uni. I can get a contextual offer at Warwick so I can apply to economics there and get in. If I was to do Economics investment banking would be the job I would like to do. There are some things that are scaring me off a bit and I thought you guys would be the perfect people to answer as you guys have been through this stage and finally got to where you want to get.
Firstly, is it really really hard to get into a job in investment banking? This is one of the biggest things putting me off as everyone's saying that there's no job security in the financial sector and especially in times like this a lot of jobs are being cut. Also, the fact that there are not many vacancies in jobs like investment banking so with so many graduates applying there wouldn't it be really really hard to get in even if you go to a uni like Warwick?
Also the long long long hours. I have researched and every single website stresses the number of hours that investment bankers put in. Like I would not mind doing these hours for the first few years of my career but the thing is like I would eventually like to start a family and spend time with them so with a job in the finance sector would I be able to get a good work-life balance?
I am not in it for the money like obviously, I would like to earn a decent wage but I think a job in the finance sector will be very interesting and fun like working on deals seems very interesting. If anyones got any advice it would be much appreciated. Like right now I am so torn between what to do so any advice would help me a lot.
Thank you