Tom Wolfe headlines Newsweek’s first digital-only issue with a return to Wall Street 25 years after Bonfire of the Vanities:
Up until 2006 a spirit of manly daring had pervaded Wall Street’s investment bankers. Trading stocks and bonds was the next thing to armed combat. The warriors, i.e., traders and salesmen, told of how fighting in combat — confronting not an armed enemy but a fan-shaped array of computer screens — created a euphoria more exhilarating than any other conceivable state of mind. It was the highest of all highs — and thanks not only to the earth-orbiting ecstasy of the battle. There was also the not inconspicuous fact that these Boomtime Boys—many of them in their 20s, still young enough to blush—were knocking back a million dollars or more a year in bonuses, year after year…
Victory as recorded on those screens made them feel like Masters of the Universe.
Definitely read the whole thing.
(Hat tip to Pax Dickinson.)