I-Bankers, trained to believe they are the best, are barely contrite

New York Magazine - The Autumn of the I-Banker

(See also: Vanity Fair - Profiles in Panic for a less interesting reporting on the state of retail to the super rich and how the super rich are coping financially.)

In a fantastic article for those of us who are on the outside looking in, this is a sharp, focused picture about the culture, mindset, and fatal flaws of Wall Street traders, some hedge fund managers, and others who were considered the 'masters of the universe'. The story begins and ends following a young trader who was making a decent salary (but not one of the super rich) at Lehman. After being fired, he took a job with 'the government', helping them to understand and regulate the mortgage banking business he just left. He believes they need him, as he has understanding of the 'real world'. The article moves between various interviews, how I-bankers believed they were the smartest people in the world, at the pinnacle of the food chain-- looking down on their college peers, government stooges, even the commercial bankers like Bank of America (hence Merrill Lynch employees who kept their jobs are angry at having to look up to BOA). Their prevailing philosophy is they they help the world by making money. Someone needs to shoulder the burdens of wealth and the i-banks need saving because 'the river flows down from the mountain'. Part of the irony exhibited here is that the wealthy lived on leveraging their own portfolios in order to get loans-- taking loans for houses and other big-ticket items using their company's stock as collateral. Now that their stock is useless, they too look like subprime borrowers. 'Leverage was their superpower'. The last part of the article nails home the point, from the [probably unintentional] double entendre: "I'm happiest when I'm making money" to the very end:
"If I had it to do all over again, you know what?" he says. "I would’ve lost more. I would’ve been bigger."