Employees at Goldman Sachs complain of 100-hour work weeks and abuse from colleagues
March 19, 2021


JUNIOR bankers at investment bank Goldman Sachs have said that they are facing ‘inhumane’ conditions, including 100-hour work weeks and ‘abuse’ from colleagues.

An internal survey among 13 first-year bankers showed they averaged 95 hours of work a week and slept five hours a night, reports said.

The survey, presented to the bank as a slideshow in February, is now circulating on Twitter.

Its contents suggest that at least one division of Goldman Sachs is still struggling with the long hours, high-pressure culture that was exposed when a 22-year-old analyst at the bank took his own life in 2015, reported The Guardian.

The graduates describe an office environment reminiscent of scenes from the recent HBO fictional TV series Industry, which depicts the lives of new staff at the London branch of a US bank.

One said: “There was a point where I was not eating, showering or doing anything else other than working from morning until after midnight.”

“The sleep deprivation, the treatment by senior bankers, the mental and physical stress … I’ve been through foster care and this is arguably worse,” another anonymous contributor to the survey said.

Sources within the bank confirmed the survey was conducted by junior analysts themselves, and presented internally before it started to circulate online.

In 2013 Moritz Erhardt, 21, a Bank of America Merrill Lynch intern, was found dead in a shower at his London flat. He had worked for 72 hours in a row and died of an epileptic seizure.

The death in 2015 concerning a Goldman Sachs analyst was that of Sarvshreshth Gupta, who had complained of working 100 hours over a week and working all night.

The analysts in the survey said that on average they were working 95 hours a week but up to 105 hours mid-February when the poll was conducted.

According to The Guardian report, the entire group said the tough conditions had adversely impacted their relationships with friends and family, and severely affected their mental and physical health.

Responding to the survey, Goldman said: “We recognise that our people are very busy, because business is strong and volumes are at historic levels. A year into Covid people are understandably quite stretched, and that’s why we are listening to their concerns and taking multiple steps to address them.”

It added that it was also transferring staff internally to help its busiest departments, and enforcing a policy of no work on Saturdays.