NYT – In my last year on Wall Street my bonus was $3.6 million \u2014 and I was angry because it wasn\u2019t big enough. I was 30 years old, had no children to raise, no debts to pay, no philanthropic goal in mind. I wanted more money for exactly the same reason an alcoholic needs another drink: I was addicted.<\/p>\n
Eight years earlier, I\u2019d walked onto the trading floor at Credit Suisse First Boston to begin my summer internship. I already knew I wanted to be rich, but when I started out I had a different idea about what wealth meant. I\u2019d come to Wall Street after reading in the book \u201cLiar\u2019s Poker\u201d how Michael Lewis earned a $225,000 bonus after just two years of work on a trading floor. That seemed like a fortune. Every January and February, I think about that time, because these are the months when bonuses are decided and distributed, when fortunes are made.<\/p>\n