Investment banking and strategy consulting are two of the most competitive fields to get into right out of college / biz school. Reasons being the pay is ludicrous. What the writer described is not uncommon for people who want to break in the industries and didn't attend a core hiring school.
Is it worth it? Depends on who you are I guess. You are rewarded with high salary and bonuses, you are working with some of the smartest people, but you are still restricted in a corporation environment.
Why don't most people do this? Who knows, may be they don't have the drive like the writer, or they simply don't know about these fields.
Mean Salary at Goldman Sachs last year was $650K. Obviously, the distribution is non-gaussian, so the median salary is significantly lower.
Meaning, you start working at GS for $100K/year, because, in a few years (if you're good) you'll grow to the $1M+ category. On a risk-adjusted basis, ibanking is the most lucrative profession.
"After racking up some rather hefty losses, I was determined to quit at one point during month four, but because I had a habit of waking up at 4:30 am I simply "forgot" that the night before I told myself I would quit and spare myself further humiliation...by then I was warned that I was now on the red list of traders ready to be cut."
They need something to attract the talent and make them "climb the walls" for the position, especially investment banks where the work can be extremely tedious.
Is it worth it? Depends on who you are I guess. You are rewarded with high salary and bonuses, you are working with some of the smartest people, but you are still restricted in a corporation environment.
Why don't most people do this? Who knows, may be they don't have the drive like the writer, or they simply don't know about these fields.