Instagram star @MrsDowJones shares an inside look at a day in her life

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  • Haley Sacks, 29, is an Instagram “finfluencer” who runs the @MrsDowJones account on Instagram (162,000 followers and counting).
  • She’s a self-proclaimed “financial pop star” who has made it her mission to improve financial literacy among young people through entertaining videos, memes, and more. 
  • From debuting a clothing line to planning to roll out her own financial e-course, Sacks has developed a unique place for herself among the Wall Street and personal finance communities. She took us along for a look inside a day in her life.
  • Are you a young person working on Wall Street? Contact this reporter via email at [email protected], encrypted messaging app Signal (561-247-5758), or direct message on Twitter @reedalexander.
  • Visit Business Insider’s homepage for more stories.

 

Haley Sacks has a simple message: Being green when it comes to money management shouldn’t prevent you from seeing green and achieving your financial goals, too.

The 29-year-old New Yorker runs the @MrsDowJones account on Instagram (162,000 followers and counting), a platform on which she has carved out a unique place for herself among the so-called “finfluencer” community.

And while many of her finmeme colleagues on Instagram take a more cloak-and-dagger approach to poking fun at Wall Street — maintaining anonymity to protect their jobs within the finance industry — Sacks is out and proud about her quirky image as a self-proclaimed “financial pop star.”

“I want to be the go-to source for financial education,” Sacks told Business Insider in a recent telephone interview.

As a result, Sacks has developed a day job filming whimsical videos on serious financial topics.

Subjects she has covered have ranged from how to negotiate your monthly rent with your landlord to why you need to stockpile 20% to 30% of your income into savings every year (using lessons drawn from the Canadian sitcom “Schitt’s Creek” to underscore the point).

Clad in paraphernalia like her silver dollar-sign earrings, and with a neon sign radiating pink and green that reads “Mrs. Dow Jones” on the wall of her Lower East Side apartment, Sacks is something of a cross between Suze Orman and Tina Fey. And she’s developed an identity, and brand of money-related advice, that are all her own.

 

Sacks grew up in NYC and is the daughter of a Goldman Sachs MD

If all of this seems like unconventional wisdom, Sacks actually has the money management gene in her blood — her father is a managing director in personal wealth management at Goldman Sachs, the elite investment firm where he has spent more than 30 years of his career.

After she graduated from Wesleyan University in Connecticut with a degree in film in 2013, Sacks returned to New York where she worked a series of random gigs, from corralling tourists to sit in the audience at CBS’ “The Late Show,” to babysitting on the Upper East Side, to dabbling in comedy at the Upright Citizens Brigade, a group that was co-founded by “SNL” icon Amy Poehler.

In 2017, she debuted Mrs. Dow Jones, a platform to share the money-management know-how she was developing for herself. “I thought I was going to be Mindy Kaling when I graduated,” she said. Instead, she became the finance fairy godmother for a generation of young people starving for knowledge about how to make their cash work for them.

She beefed up her command of personal finance by reading tomes on business and money management — like Warren Buffett’s “Ground Rules” and the famed 1937 book “Think and Grow Rich.” The rest she learned through experience.

Haley Sacks at home in New York



Haley Sacks


While it took some time for Mrs. Dow Jones to become a fully sustainable gig — Sacks said she turned a corner and it became her sole moneymaker last year — she made income through digital consulting work while building up her platform, and has since inked brand deals with the likes of dating app Bumble, cosmetics line Clarins, and the professional organization website Monday.com.

For context, the audience whom she’s targeting could certainly use the financial guidance.

Gen Z’ers and millennials are the two groups that had the least financial experience in key categories like writing a check, applying for a credit card, or contributing to a retirement savings account, according a survey released earlier this year by NerdWallet.

Forty-one percent of Gen Z’ers (ages 18-23) reported feeling “anxious” about the current state of their finances, and 40% said that they were “nervous/confused” about it, the survey also found.

Sacks plans to change that. One way is by pursuing her certified financial planner designation — she’s currently enrolled in online classes at Northwestern University for her CFP certification.

Another is by aiming “to have the no. 1 financial talk show on TV,” she said. “I really want to have a talk show where we talk about everything, the tea and everything, but we also talk about money.”

Sacks invited us along for a day in her life — and, between creating videos for her Instagram account, working on her forthcoming digital finance education platform, and acing her schoolwork at Northwestern, one thing’s for sure: Mrs. Dow Jones is about to give you a run for your money.

Are you a young person working on Wall Street? Contact this reporter via email at [email protected], encrypted messaging app Signal (561-247-5758), or direct message on Twitter @reedalexander.



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