Who are they? City workers.
What are they? According to a 2016 survey, 454,700 people are currently employed in the City of London. The sector contributed the equivalent of 11.5 percent of total UK government tax receipts last year. Even in the face of Brexit, London is still considered the financial centre of the world.Yet, despite their central role in City life, the hedge-fund managers and insurance brokers remain something of a mystery, beyond the cliches that exist in everyone’s heads. For those living in the capital, "City boys", and girls, are phantom figures. We envisage them to be brash and braying – materialistic and cut-throat, balancing long hours in the office with a taste for the flashier end of hedonism. As ever, the truth is far more complicated than that.
What are they? According to a 2016 survey, 454,700 people are currently employed in the City of London. The sector contributed the equivalent of 11.5 percent of total UK government tax receipts last year. Even in the face of Brexit, London is still considered the financial centre of the world.Yet, despite their central role in City life, the hedge-fund managers and insurance brokers remain something of a mystery, beyond the cliches that exist in everyone’s heads. For those living in the capital, "City boys", and girls, are phantom figures. We envisage them to be brash and braying – materialistic and cut-throat, balancing long hours in the office with a taste for the flashier end of hedonism. As ever, the truth is far more complicated than that.
Advertisement
For this instalment of the VICE UK census, we spoke to people under 30 who work in demanding jobs in the City – from banking to commercial law – in an effort to understand the people behind the suits.
Andreas, 29 (Photographed)
Advertisement
There’s one guy on my floor who is 24 – he didn’t do a masters, so went straight into work at 21. He told me his hobbies were young women and aged wine. I thought, 'Jesus, I bet your dad told you to say that.' What a hollow statement.My previous job in London involved getting in at 9AM and not leaving 'til 10PM. You don’t settle down, because you leave work full of adrenalin. I was on Tinder looking for something to do. I’d go out and drink, get home and sleep. I got to the point where I was like: when was the last time I cooked myself a dinner?When you’re in a corporate job the people that manage you are often megalomaniacs – proper cokehead nutjobs. The bosses were horrible. They’d make jokes about Russian hookers and shit. We had a Christmas party and it was just a big public wank to show off how rich the CEO was. They bought us all Apple watches and took us to really fancy clubs. It was the kind of place where grown men were throwing tantrums. They hired people because of contacts, so it was just little rich kids who hadn’t had a job before. I’m from a working class background, but you wouldn’t know it. I don’t think they realised how much I felt like an outsider looking in.When we were growing up, me and all my friends said we were never going to work for The Man. Now, I’ve got a friend who works for a company that makes missiles, I’m like, where did your morals go? I think everything goes out the window when you put on a suit and tie.
Jess, 22
Advertisement
Elena, 26
Advertisement
You actually end up bonding with your colleagues. Almost like comrades in the military. A lot of my colleagues I’m still friends with. Eventually I got a job somewhere else. It was less money, less in the way of benefits, they weren’t offering me a training contract, but it was another job, so I was like, "I’ll take it" and quit immediately.In my final year of uni I realised I wanted to work in banking. I never drank on weeknights until I worked in the City. Once you see other respectable people going to the pub three nights a week it becomes normal. Which is a shame, cos it’s expensive and boring. It’s boring getting to the end of a month and having no money and having to call your parents.I think the finance sector is our biggest contributor to tax in the UK. Without it, London wouldn’t be what it is, like it or not. We are the global centre of finance. We’re not a world leader in any other sector any more, not engineering or medical. I’m not an overtly political person – I wouldn’t dream of voting Labour, but I don’t know if I could bring myself to vote Conservative either. I think the working culture affects my views; most of my colleagues are Tories and probably wouldn’t ever vote any other way.When I was at school I decided I wanted to be rich. That was my main goal in life. I wasn’t sure how exactly to do that, but I decided a good education was probably the best. I thought being a lawyer would be boring, but that law would be a career that gave me lots of options.The actual day-to-day work is fucking boring, but they pay you loads. My hours are my main problem. When you go into the office in the morning you have no idea when you’re going to leave again. There are beds and a doctor’s surgery in the office. There’s a hairdressers and a gym. You actually don’t need to leave. My worst night ever, I was here until 4:30AM. Once it gets past a certain time you can order food, so I ended up crying into chicken nuggets.
Edward, 25
Leonie, 24
Advertisement
I don’t think there's much space for someone who is black and not posh. For me, it’s a big reason why I don’t think I’ll stay very long. There just isn’t anyone like me here, which is really tiring. There’s a lot of ignorance, rarely intentioned, but it’s tiring. There is no diversity at the top at all.I hate the weather in this country, but what I hate even more than the weather are the high taxes. It can be frustrating working as hard as I do in the City and then seeing almost half the money you’ve earned not even reach your bank account. If I could change anything, it would be that.People think it’s all numbers in investment banking, but it’s not true. In my role as a relationship manager my focus is around building and maintaining relationships. You have to be a people person for that, be able to create a rapport with people from different walks of life. The paperwork side of things can be hell, and sometimes clients who may be in different timezones, forget you're off the clock at 5:30PM. Then you end up staying in the office till 9PM, sometimes even past 12 in the morning.I think with time, though, you regulate the much craved-for work-life balance. I have, anyway. I no longer allow my job to affect my social life. In fact, because relationships are at the core of my role, I’ve become even more sociable. Bankers work very hard and they play hard too, but please don’t think we’re all out here living the life of the characters in the Wolf of Wall Street movie – that’s definitely not the case.
AJ, 28
Advertisement
Kaz, 27
Nicholas, 25
Advertisement