Wall Street struggles to pay people enough for 72 hour weeks

[Bloomberg]( Follow Us [Get the newsletter]( This is Bloomberg Opinion Today, a pseudonymous novel of Bloomberg Opinion’s opinions. [Sign up here](. Today’s Agenda - Banks [can’t pay people enough money]( to work for them. - Post-pandemic wedding boom may [trigger a post-pandemic divorce boom](. - America [isn’t handling its proxy wars very well](. - Beware [stock markets bearing buy signals](. This had better be worth it. Source: MediaNews Group/The Mercury News/MediaNews Group RM/Getty Images Banks Struggle to Lure Grads to a Life of Napping Under Desks How much money would it take to convince you to work 72 hours a week for three years? Would $10,000 be enough? That’s the bonus some investment banks are now offering to pretty please come be first-year analysts for them. It might sound like a lot of money if you’re just out of college. But Marcus Ashworth notes [it amounts to about $1 an hour over the course of those grueling three years](, which is apparently now the industry standard of suffering required to get your banking Tenderfoot badge. That $1 becomes even less appealing when you consider you could instead spend those years at a flying-taxi startup or mining Bitcoin or writing [pseudonymous novels](. With all the free time you’ll get from not doing banking, maybe you could do all three. For a good while there, people [worried]( about all the STEM grads going to Wall Street to slice and dice securities instead of atoms. Now those grads have other avenues to wealth and fulfillment, and they’re taking them. Banks will either have to pay more or try harder to be appealing. Read the [whole thing](. Love in the Time of Coronavirus Anybody who’s ever fallen in love at a summer camp, reality TV show or hostage situation knows big commitments made in extreme psychological conditions don’t always last. But a pandemic might be different. People [aren’t]( returning their quarantine pets, and history suggests [marriages formed during hard times might be more durable](, Stephen Mihm writes. Then again, a divorce boom might follow the boom in post([ish]()-pandemic weddings happening now. Also of uncertain staying power is any rush to build housing in small cities to meet the demand of people fleeing bigger ones, writes Conor Sen. Right now [the economics of building apartments are better in Spokane]( than in San Francisco. But a few years after the pandemic, Spokane might end up like that summer-camp romance: a pleasant, fading memory. The New Cold War Some things never change. The U.S. and the Soviet Union fought their long cold war through proxies. Now the same thing is happening with the new cold war(s) happening between America, Russia, China and Iran. Russia is hiring mercenaries and criminals to harass and hack American interests, while Iran is doing the same thing but with militias, writes Hal Brands. The U.S. is fighting back a bit, but [it’s generally not handling the situation well](. It wants to stay focused on China and avoid escalating other conflicts. But that means the harassment and hacking continue. The Biden administration did get it right when it worked with allies to [bring criminal charges against alleged Chinese hackers](, Bloomberg’s editorial board writes. Maybe the way to deal with harassment and hacking without raising tensions too high is to have a unified front grinding methodically against it. Telltale Charts A can’t-lose “[buy” signal is flashing in the stock market](, writes John Authers. It’s a trap! Luxury brands are [cashing in on a post-pandemic rebound]( to get ready for what comes next, writes Andrea Felsted. Further Reading The [$26 billion opioid settlement isn’t nearly enough](, but the lawyers will push it anyway, for money. — Joe Nocera [Antiviral drugs that might be available early next year]( could be a big weapon in the fight against Covid. — Sam Fazeli Vaccine mandates in limited situations [don’t conflict with libertarian principles](. — Stephen Carter [PG&E’s unworkable plan to bury all its wires]( is probably a PR ploy. — Liam Denning When faced with political controversies, [companies can either become mules or mice](. — Ben Schott ICYMI U.S.-China [trade is booming again](. The Olympics [fired another opening ceremony director](. Secrets of a [superyacht deckhand](. Kickers Meet the [Fyre Festival of sleepaway camps](. (h/t Scott Kominers) Scientists find a [4.6 billion-year-old meteorite](. Our civilization’s collapse is [progressing right on schedule](. How to [get more out of reading](. Notes: Please send caviar helicopters and complaints to Mark Gongloff at mgongloff1@bloomberg.net. [Sign up here]( and follow us on [Twitter]( and [Facebook](. Like Bloomberg Opinion Today? [Subscribe to Bloomberg All Access and get much, much more](. You’ll receive our unmatched global news coverage and two in-depth daily newsletters, The Bloomberg Open and The Bloomberg Close. Before it’s here, it’s on the Bloomberg Terminal. Find out more about how the Terminal delivers information and analysis that financial professionals can’t find anywhere else. [Learn more](. You received this message because you are subscribed to Bloomberg's Bloomberg Opinion Today newsletter. [Unsubscribe]( | [Bloomberg.com]( | [Contact Us]( Bloomberg L.P. 731 Lexington, New York, NY, 10022