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Lumifer comments on Earning to Give vs. Altruistic Career Choice Revisited - Less Wrong
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10% is the charitable giving limit. There is another thing to be asked about, and that is the impact of the job. If I were to be a tax lawyer, I would be directly harming the ability of the US government to spend on social welfare programs. If I worked on Wall Street anywhere but Vanguard I would be bilking people out of their life savings, and at Vanguard I wouldn't be making $100 K a year. Someone working as a tobacco farmer to raise money for cancer research has some misplaced priorities.
You could always go work for the IRS. It employs a lot of tax lawyers.
But there's a bigger issue: you think that the work of a (privately employed) tax lawyer intrinsically harms the ability of the US government to spend? That belief has LOTS of issues. I'll start with two: One, why do you think the capability of the US government to spend is an unalloyed good thing? And two, do you happen to know the volume (say, in feet of shelf space) of the current tax laws, regulations, and rulings? I'd recommend you find out and then think about whether any moderately complicated business can comply with them without the help of a tax lawyer.
Sigh. First, Vanguard is not part of Wall Street. Second... you really should not believe everything the popular media keeps feeding you.
Tax lawyers can not decrease taxes taken by US government in the long run, because US government gets to make the law adjusting for the existence of tax lawyering. This is why I have absolutely no qualms about employing a tax lawyer in the US.
By "Wall Street" I'm including the Buy Side as well as the Sell Side. The big buyside firms like Fidelity and Charles Schwab sell products that most people shouldn't buy. Insurance probably has a better case to buy some actively managed products, or some exotic derivatives, but I don't know why it can't do it itself.
To the extent that finance reallocates risk it can provide a positive utility benefit. However, the very productive businesses have questionable utility. Promoting active trading, picking hot funds etc, all eat into the returns clients can expect. Justify the existence of Charles Schwab's S&P 500 index fund, with expense ratio twice that of Vanguards. The most profitable divisions of investment banks tend to be the ones with the least competition, and hence most questionable social benefit.
I'm aware Dodge and Cox is in SF, and Vanguard in Valley Forge, Blackrock in Princeton, etc. However, they are all on "the Street".
The IRS doesn't pay well: for government pay one might as well work for NASA and accomplish something fun.