Pros
name recognition, structured promotion process - they will eventually promote you (this works both ways though - not always a good thing), job security, flexible time off when not busy (this is rare in tax since you will always be busy), lots of young people, social aspect is good for a first job or new to the city, free blackberry and laptop for work purposes and some personal usage, no set time to come in (but also no set time to leave), able to charge dinner and cabs on your firm amex card, flexible with doctor appointments, etc., mostly everyone is miserable together so at least you don't feel alone - it is a bonding experience
Cons
100+ hr weeks in multiple busy seasons - for tax the busy deadlines are year end provisions, 3/15, 4/15, 9/15, 10/15, 12/15, and quarterly deadlines, -- you will ALWAYS be busy to the point of exhaustion it is common for staff through partners to work over nights during busy seasons, terrible scheduling - you literally will have 20 bosses all on different client teams & yes, everyone expects you to make their client your top priority which often leads to having to stay very late every night/weekend, poor leadership from directors and partners - most directors in my group don't have families or spouses so they expect the same of you & the partners feel it is their right to put staff through the misery that they went through in order to make partner, unreasonable expectations - obviously staff eat hours, decreasing their client utilization but having to stay until 2am every night anyway to appear profitable for the firm which skews the "norm" completion time for everyone else on similar projects, POLITICS - comparable to investment banking, only we make half as much if not less people need to relax this is just taxes.
