In the 1990s, women in record numbers looked to Wall Street as a great place to build successful and lucrative careers.What many of them found there was not meritocracy, but a boy’s club of misbehaving stockbrokers, and a workplace culture that knew no bounds in its harassment and discriminating behavior toward women. Sometimes it was threatening language; other times it was physical intimidation; but often, it was much worse. Eventually, women who were subjected to this behavior exploited a loophole in stock-exchange rules and opened the door to unprecedented lawsuits that shook Wall Street to its very core. Taking its title from the notorious party room at Smith Barney's Garden City, New York branch, Tales from the Boom-Boom Room is the detailed and riveting insider account of the lewd and obscene behavior that has run rampant on Wall Street. In this edition, author Susan Antilla provides a new afterword maintaining that despite some improvements in workplace conditions, women continue to face an uphill battle on Wall Street.

Tales from the Boom-Boom Room

Business & Money

Antilla, Susan

Business Culture

Harper Paperbacks

Tales from the boom-boom Room

Women & Business

Scribe Publications

In the 1990s, women in record numbers looked to Wall Street as a great place to build successful and lucrative careers. What many of them found there was no meritocracy, but an industry living by the rules of a 1960s fraternity, with the money and legal clout to silence any challenges. Award-winning columnist Susan Antilla broke the story of shocking sex discrimination at Smith Barney and other major brokers. Her disclosures in the press were a rallying cry for class actions challenging the sexual hazing and outrageous disparities in pay that shackled professional women on Wall Street. Taking its title from the infamous basement party room of Smith Barney’s Garden City, New York, branch office, and representing years of extensive research, Tales from the Boom-Boom Room traces the story of the lead whistle-blower, Pam Martens, the crusading broker who put an entire industry on the defensive, then found herself at odds not just with her local bosses and with powerful figures like Travelers Group president Jamie Dimon, but with her coplaintiffs and attorneys. The women’s employment agreements forbade them to sue, and only an ingenious legal strategy circumvented that virtual gag rule and brought the scandal out from behind the closed doors of arbitration. This is a riveting human, legal, and business drama of women and men in the financial institutions on Wall Street and around America.

Tales from the Boom-Boom Room: Women vs. Wall Street

Economics

Bloomberg Press

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