Wall Street Unoccupied With 200,000 Job Cuts
Wall Street rebounded from the financial crisis of 2008 with the help of unprecedented government support, including loans from the U.S. Federal Reserve. Goldman Sachs posted record profit the following year, and bonuses paid to securities-firm employees in New York City rose 17 percent to $20.3 billion, according to New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli.
Now, faced with higher capital requirements, the failure of exotic financial products and diminished proprietary trading, the industry is undergoing what Steven Eckhaus, chairman of the executive-employment practice at Katten Muchin Rosenman LLP, called “a paradigm shift.” The New York attorney, whose clients have included former Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. Chief Financial Officer Erin Callan, said he has stopped giving his “spiel” about inherent talent leading to new work.
In interviews, a dozen people who have lost jobs at firms including Societe Generale SA, Royal Bank of Scotland Group Plc (RBS) and Jefferies Group Inc. (JEF) described a grim banking landscape that also includes Occupy Wall Street protests against unemployment stuck above 9 percent and income inequality.
“These are by far my darkest days,” said Scott Schubert, 49, who was dismissed in late 2008 as a mergers-and-acquisitions banker at Jefferies, a New York-based securities firm, and has been unemployed since. “It’s harder and harder to look for a job and feel that there’s nothing there.”
