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Ask HN: Recommend books that give you insight into other professions

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Re: Ask HN: Recommend books that give you insight into other professions

#11

Post by ghaff »

swyx wrote: post #6

Ex finance guy here - Liar's Poker for 1980s Wall Street, When Genius Failed for 1990s, More Money Than God for 2000s, Flash Boys for 2010s - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liar%27s_Poker - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_Genius_Failed - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/More_Money_Than_God - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_Boys obviously these do not represent all of finance but its a nice decade-by-decade recap o…

Monkey Business was a pretty funny read too--for certain definitions of funny.

Re: Ask HN: Recommend books that give you insight into other professions

#12

Post by travmatt »

swyx wrote: post #6

Ex finance guy here - Liar's Poker for 1980s Wall Street, When Genius Failed for 1990s, More Money Than God for 2000s, Flash Boys for 2010s - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liar%27s_Poker - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_Genius_Failed - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/More_Money_Than_God - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_Boys obviously these do not represent all of finance but its a nice decade-by-decade recap o…

If you like books on finance and history, “Reminiscences of a Stock Operator” by Edwin Lefèvre is also an excellent book, and an interesting view into early Wall Street.

Re: Ask HN: Recommend books that give you insight into other professions

#13

Post by swyx »

cambalache wrote: post #10
swyx wrote: post #6

Ex finance guy here - Liar's Poker for 1980s Wall Street, When Genius Failed for 1990s, More Money Than God for 2000s, Flash Boys for 2010s - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liar%27s_Poker - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_Genius_Failed - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/More_Money_Than_God - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_Boys obviously these do not represent all of finance but its a nice decade-by-decade recap o…

Those are all good recommendations, but if anything tech/SV is resembling every day more and more to 1980s WS.

yep. i'm merely one of many finance bros that escaped to tech. if you work in martech, then you absolutely outpaced wallstreet haha.

Re: Ask HN: Recommend books that give you insight into other professions

#14

Post by potions »

Diary of a Very Bad Year: Confessions of an Anonymous Hedge Fund Manager is really entertaining and lucid if you are interested in a 'casual'(in tone) explanation of the global financial crisis.

It's a set of interviews with "n+1 magazine" from the course of the year later expanded and collated.

Re: Ask HN: Recommend books that give you insight into other professions

#15

Post by gonehome »

swyx wrote: post #6

Ex finance guy here - Liar's Poker for 1980s Wall Street, When Genius Failed for 1990s, More Money Than God for 2000s, Flash Boys for 2010s - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liar%27s_Poker - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_Genius_Failed - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/More_Money_Than_God - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_Boys obviously these do not represent all of finance but its a nice decade-by-decade recap o…

Patio11 specifically calls out flash boys as bad and inaccurate.

He recommends: https://www.amazon.com/Flash-Boys-Insiders-Perspective-High-...

Which I’ve had on my shelf for a while, but haven’t yet read.

Re: Ask HN: Recommend books that give you insight into other professions

#16

Post by ghaff »

cambalache wrote: post #10
swyx wrote: post #6

Ex finance guy here - Liar's Poker for 1980s Wall Street, When Genius Failed for 1990s, More Money Than God for 2000s, Flash Boys for 2010s - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liar%27s_Poker - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_Genius_Failed - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/More_Money_Than_God - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_Boys obviously these do not represent all of finance but its a nice decade-by-decade recap o…

Those are all good recommendations, but if anything tech/SV is resembling every day more and more to 1980s WS.

I think it's different in that you do have some subset of people who think they're doing things for the common good, and some actually are, but...

"Greed is good" Gordon Gecko

Re: Ask HN: Recommend books that give you insight into other professions

#18

Post by swyx »

gonehome wrote: post #15
swyx wrote: post #6

Ex finance guy here - Liar's Poker for 1980s Wall Street, When Genius Failed for 1990s, More Money Than God for 2000s, Flash Boys for 2010s - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liar%27s_Poker - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_Genius_Failed - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/More_Money_Than_God - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_Boys obviously these do not represent all of finance but its a nice decade-by-decade recap o…

Patio11 specifically calls out flash boys as bad and inaccurate. He recommends: https://www.amazon.com/Flash-Boys-Insiders-Perspective-High-... Which I’ve had on my shelf for a while, but haven’t yet read.

i love a good patio11 takedown. got a source for his call out?

Re: Ask HN: Recommend books that give you insight into other professions

#19

Post by M5x7wI3CmbEem10 »

swyx wrote: post #6

Ex finance guy here - Liar's Poker for 1980s Wall Street, When Genius Failed for 1990s, More Money Than God for 2000s, Flash Boys for 2010s - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liar%27s_Poker - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_Genius_Failed - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/More_Money_Than_God - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flash_Boys obviously these do not represent all of finance but its a nice decade-by-decade recap o…

May I ask why you left finance for tech? I'm considering going into trading instead of SWE because the environment may be more social. I also spend a lot time analyzing current events, so why not get paid for it, too?
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