<p>hey, I was wondering how good harvard's econ program is compared to other top schools in terms of postgraduation salaries. What does an econ major usually earn after graduation and how does that compare to, let's say, wharton or princeton?</p>
<p>You're confusing Economics with Finance. Wharton grads reign supreme in the Investment Banking industry, and Princeton's Engineers are the ones who end up on wall-street, not it's econ majors.</p>
<p>oh, actually I'm aware that there is a difference between econ and finance, but I just wanted to know how the respective salaries after graduation compare to each other.
however, i did not know that it's princetons engineers that end up on wall street, what kind of engineers do you mean?</p>
<p>At Princeton and Columbia and to an extent MIT, the "engineers" are often recruited more heavily than the CAS'ers simply because engineers face a much harder curriculum and demonstrate they have the muster to succeed in tough courses. At Princeton and Columbia, "Financial Engineering" is quickly growing to become one of the most popular majors/concentrations and a LOT LOT of Columbians and Princetonians end up with great wall street jobs. Econ is more a social science... not very applicable at all in the real world (speaking as a prospective econ major). It's a lot more academic.</p>
<p>Postgraduation salaries? If you're in an Ivy League School/MIT, your degree- yes even a HARVARD degree- will in most cases get you as far as an interview. What happens after that depends on your interview. So what am I saying? There's little difference between Harvard's, Yale's, Princeton's, Columbia's, Dartmouth's etc. etc. "starting salaries" because it's independant of the education and more dependant on the type of person going to each school and his/her's individual achievements. With that said however, Whartonites are known for landing the top IB jobs and most don't need to go back for an MBA. No other school can match this. But on the flip side- god help you if you decide 2 years in IB that you hate finance and want to do medicine or law or something... your wharton degree isnt gonna help you much in that regards.</p>
<p>Oh, you know why undergraduate schools generally don't make "salary charts" like grad schools? Cuz the average starting salary at Harvard is ~55k, and the average starting salary from NYU ~55k. Now consider that you just dumped ~150k on your education... The real difference is admissions into law/medical schools. </p>
<p>People need to chill with this association between IVY and $$$. Whatever happened to learning from and being around the best and the brightest for it's own sake?...</p>
<p>yeah, i thought about IB too. but now i think i might want to be an econ professor unless i have some awesome idea and become an entrepreneur. IB is just too mundane. </p>
<p>Are there any current econ major who would like to share what do most Harvard econ major graduates do?</p>
<p>The Whartonites who claim they get all the best IB jobs are dumb. Now, Wharton is a great school, but it's not the best. As for as IB (and Private Equity, etc.) go, Harvard = Wharton. A lot of the bigger firms recruit only Harvard and Wharton grads.</p>
<p>Harvard economics is the best economics program you'll find anywhere. (U Chicago is pretty good too). Harvard has some of the biggest names in Economics on its teaching staff and the classes are excellent.</p>
<p>i found this very helpful article: <a href="http://prefrosh.net/go/Business%5B/url%5D">http://prefrosh.net/go/Business</a></p>
<p>List of companies recruiting on campus at Harvard: <a href="http://www.ocs.fas.harvard.edu/students/jobs/full-time.htm%5B/url%5D">http://www.ocs.fas.harvard.edu/students/jobs/full-time.htm</a></p>
<p>I get the impression that most Harvard econ majors go into finance/consulting, but like truazn said, econ≠finance. Harvard does offer some finance classes in its Ec dept (capital markets, corporate finance) and some students cross register at MIT to take accounting/other finance classes there.</p>
<p>I've also heard that the salaries are pretty much comparable and the H-bomb tends to help in getting an interview, same as a graduate from Wharton. I'm going through the same thing but I'm looking at the chances of getting into a graduate program.</p>
<p>Truazn,</p>
<p>That was perhaps the best post I've read about econ/finance distinctions - including a great observation about what learning ought to be about. Congrats!</p>
<ul>
<li>Another prospective econ major</li>
</ul>
<p>I've heard that while Harvard Econ has great professors, the classes are huge and the advising is terrible. Is this right? Anyway, I've often heard that UChicago Econ is the best in the world, though it's definitely academic and theoretical as opposed to businessey.</p>
<p>sorry if it's a real dumb question, but what exactly are "IB jobs"?</p>
<p>search Pro Mankiw`s Blog</p>
<p>Investment banking jobs.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.careers-in-finance.com/ib.htm%5B/url%5D">http://www.careers-in-finance.com/ib.htm</a></p>