How significant is the difference between a top Engineering school and a lower one?

College Majors Engineering Majors
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I guess a fair way of thinking of the situation would be like this. What do you think is harder- getting a job at an "elite" engineering company like Microsoft or getting hired by McKinsey.</p>

<p>I think we can both agree that McKinsey is probably more difficult. </p>

<p>So if it is harder to get a job at McKinsey, then it should not be shocking that these McKinsey employees are getting paid better.

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<p>Actually, no, I am not sure about that. While obviously the pay at McKinsey isn't skimpy, it actually isn't as high are some people think that it is. </p>

<p>Let me tell you about another strange phenomenom that I have noticed amongst engineering. The big prestigious companies all tend to pay about the same for the same kind of degree. Hence, the computer engineers at Microsoft are getting paid roughly the same as the ones at Sun at Oracle, possibly with a cost-of-living adjustment. Yeah, there will be a differential of maybe +/- $5000 or so, but it's really not that big.</p>

<p>But then there are certain small no-name engineering companies that really will pay a lot for new engineers. I have heard of guys today coming out fresh from undergrad at MIT and Stanford and making a very high salary for working as engineers, sometimes over 6 figures. </p>

<p>In fact, this phenomenom was most prevalent during the dotcom boom. During the boom, there really were guys getting their BS's in computer science from Stanford and getting offers of 125k, 150k and up. I distinctly remember reading a trade magazine where a 21-year old kid still in college said that he wouldn't even talk to an employer if the offer was less than 120k. I believe there really were people who really did manage to get salaries as computer engineers for over 200k right after undergrad. {Of course, this has to be put in proper perspective. This was a time when Silicon Valley was filled with lots of paper millionaires. Heck, my friend's cousin who was in his early 20's and who hadn't even graduated from high school and was just working as a simple web-site developer and tester for a dotcom was, at one point, sitting on over $5 million of paper stock options. Of course when the bust happened, almost all of it went right into the drain. I think he managed to buy a Porsche with what was left, but that's all he got. Still, a brand new Porsche, paid with cash, for a high school dropout isn't bad.}</p>

<p>But the point is, it wasn't the established companies in Silicon Valley that were paying those kinds of exorbitant salaries. No, it was the aggressive startups. And not just all of the startups. In fact, not even the majority of them. The majority of startups were hard-up on cash and offered salaries that were even lower than the big companies. However, there were some startups that were completely flush with VC money and wanted to grow as quickly as possible, so they thought nothing about paying 2 or 3 times the prevailing wage to hire people. </p>

<p>In fact, I just finished reading a book on the rise of the company Oracle. In the early days of Oracle, people joined mostly because it was seen as a great way to get rich quick. Oracle was known as a place where people could make extremely high salaries and bonuses. Heck, Ray Lane, the former COO of Oracle, was tempted away to Oracle from the management consulting firm Booz Allen. How? Simple. Money. Ray Lane was a partner at Booz Allen but Oracle basically made him an offer he couldn't refuse. When Ray Lane left or was fired from Oracle in 2000, he was worth over $1 billion. He would never have come even close to making that kind of money at Booz Allen.</p>

<p>So let me come full circle. Why do engineers choose to work in consulting? It's only partly due to the money. Even today, you can find small no-name startups that are willing to pay exceptionally high salaries to new engineering graduates who have the right skills. It's not like it was during the boom, but there are always highly aggressive startups that are trying to ramp up, and are thus willing to pay top dollar. It's not easy to find them - you have to do a lot of legwork - but they are there. So if you want to be paid well right out of school, that's probably the best way you can go. </p>

<p>Again, keep in mind that the majority of small companies don't pay very well. But there are some that pay exceedingly well. In other words, small companies tend to show a large variance in what they pay. Some of them pay crap. But some of them pay a lot - far better than what you can get in consulting. </p>

<p>What consulting seems to offer is pay that is higher than the engineering average. More importantly, consulting offers PRESTIGE. I think this is the real heart of the matter. You're really getting paid in prestige. It's like when the best students out of Harvard and Yale Law turn down highly lucrative private sector firm jobs to clerk for a judge a couple of years, despite the fact that clerks get paid a pittance. Clerkships pay poorly but are extremely prestigious. Consulting doesn't pay poorly (in fact, it pays well), but I think people are really want it for the prestige. </p>

<p>I think it also comes down to risk. I think there is little doubt that if you manage to get into the right startup company that enjoys great success, you will have an extremely successful career and make a lot of money. The engineers who got into Microsoft and Google in the beginning are all super-rich. Not only that, but they got to do work that was far far more exciting and consequential than anything they could have done if they had been working for a big computer company like IBM. The problem of course is that you don't know which startup is going to be highly successful. So you're taking a risk with your career. The startup might go bankrupt and so you have to find another job. Much of your compensation may be in the form of bonuses of stock options, so if the company doesn't do well, then you don't make much money. {Of course, if the company does very well, then you can become extremely wealthy very quickly}. </p>

<p>What big companies then really offer is not so much money. Big companies offer security. Working for a big company will give you a solid, stable, middle-class lifestyle. Working for a consulting company will also give you a solid, stable, upper-middle-class lifestyle that also has a lot of prestige. But if you really just want to make money and you can put up with the risk, then you don't go down either of those paths. Instead, you go seek out a promising startup. Yes, they're harder to find because they generally don't recruit on campus. But that's the kind of opportunity you should seek if you want the shot at becoming extremely rich and can put up with the risk.</p>

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<p>I have to disagree with you jma. While McKinsey is probably the hardest company to get into in consulting, it doesn't mean that it's harder to get in than Microsoft or other top engineering firms. Consulting and engineering look for different people. Yes, it's probably easier for an MIT engineer to get a job at a top engineering firm than at McKinsey, Bain or BCG. But, it's almost impossible for a Harvard econ major to get a job at Boeing as an engineer. However, a Harvard econ major's chance of getting an offer from those top three consulting firms or ibanks are much higher. From my personal experience, I can tell you that I had a more difficult time getting an interview with a top US engineering/pharma firm than a top consulting firm. I got an interview with McKinsey, while I was turned down by Pfizer R&D in resume screening.</p>

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<p>Yeah, but ecc, you missed a crucial point. It's not about how easy it is to get the interview, it's about how easy it is to get the job. McKinsey and other consulting companies are well known for casting a quite wide net when it comes to interviews. Basically, if you go to an elite school and your academic record is fairly decent, you can probably get an interview at McKinsey. </p>

<p>But doesn't mean that you're actually going to get an offer from McKinsey. Far from it, in fact. To get that offer, you have to survive several rounds of interviews where they whittle candidates down. In other words, the consulting companies are quite willing to take a flyer on an interview just to see what happens. </p>

<p>Contrast that with an engineering company where if you can even get an interview, you stand a pretty decent chance of getting the job. Many engineering companies, from what I've seen, do not cast a wide net, so if they call you in to interview, you stand a pretty decent chance of getting an offer. In fact, from what I've seen, engineering companies are often times ready to provide first-round spot offers. Do decently in that first interview, and many of them will give you the job offer right then and there. </p>

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Yes, it's probably easier for an MIT engineer to get a job at a top engineering firm than at McKinsey, Bain or BCG. But, it's almost impossible for a Harvard econ major to get a job at Boeing as an engineer

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<p>That's an extremely unfair example. It is of course true that it is impossible for a Harvard econ major to get hired as an engineer. But that's a completely unfair comparison. That's like saying that a a guy who graduated from Harvard Medical School will have less chance of getting hired as a lawyer as somebody who graduated from a no-name law school. It is true, but irrelevant. </p>

<p>The real question is how hard is it for a person to accomplish something when he still has the freedom to choose his career path. What I mean by that is, take your typical 18 year old high school senior. Is it more likely that this guy will eventually get an offer as a McKinsey consultant or a Boeing engineer? I believe it's clearly the latter. Why? Because the fact is, Boeing hires engineers from many schools, including many no-name engineering schools. For example, I know that Boeing recruits at Washington State University. Let's face it. WSU is not exactly Harvard or MIT. McKinsey, on the other hand, only recruits at the top schools. And that doesn't include WSU.</p>

<p>So when you look at it that way, I think you can tell that becoming a Boeing engineer is easier than becoming a McKinsey consultant. After all, i would argue that it's significantly easier for a high school senior to get admitted to WSU or a similar no-name school, finish an engineering degree, and then get hired by Boeing, then it is to get into an elite school and then get hired by McKinsey.</p>

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<p>I don't think it's fair for you to say being a Boeing engineer is easier than becoming a McKinsey consultant. It's like comparing apples to oranges. My point is that these two fields look for different types of people, and you just can't say which one is harder. I agree with you that McKinsey's interview spot is easier to get than companies like Microsoft. But, haven't you realized that in order to get that Microsoft interview there were already years of self-selection involved. On the other hand, a pretty smart guy who can think quickly on the spot can get a McKinsey interview easily. </p>

<p>Anyway, I just don't think it's fair for previous poster to say that McKinsey is much harder to get in than a top engineering firm for an MIT grad; thus, consulting is harder than engineering. I have my highest respect for consultant and I am currently in the process of applying for a McKinsey office abroad. I know people who got offers from those top consulting firms. They are very smart and sharp. However, the most brilliant people I met at my very respectable engineering school are the people who are going to work for google, microsoft or pursuing a Ph.D.</p>

<p>Finally, I do agree with your last point. It is pretty sad to see all these top engineering companies to recruit from no-name schools. I have friends who did co-op in Intel Arizona and she told me that Intel Arizona recruit from ASU than top engineering schools in the midwest or the east. I am sure on any given day if you find an average engineer in the US and an average management consultant in the US, the consultant is most likely the smarter one. No wonder Wall Street is doing great, while companies like GM and Ford constantly lose to its Japanese competitors in designing better cars.</p>

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<p>"I am familiar with three different engineering companies in Chicago that are each dominated by graduates of the same university as the founder: Purdue, Illinois and Notre Dame. '</p>

<p>I might have worked for the Illinois one. Or else a different big firm with the same profile.</p>

<p>What I think was significant about that firm for purposes of this conversation is:</p>

<p>They hired grads from prestigious schools far away, to a relatively small extent .</p>

<p>But mostly, by far, they hired grads from prestigious schools within their region. Also well represented were grads from local schools with no national reputation to speak of that were nearby and easy to recruit at.</p>

<p>At this large firm there was clearly a significant regional bent to a lot of its hiring. So, to draw an analogy for the OP, if the plan is to look for engineering opportunities in California after graduation you will probably be exposed to more such opportunities if you stay in California for college. Not every California firm is going to trek to Illinois looking for new engineers when there is such good hunting right at home. IMO.</p>

<p>IF you were more oriented to looking for the best job for you nationally rather than just staying in California, then MAYBE Illinois may offer some advantage. But on the other hand everyone knows UCLA. You might check with the respective college placement offices to see if you can figure out where the recruiting engineering companies are located.</p>

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<p>
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I know people who got offers from those top consulting firms. They are very smart and sharp. However, the most brilliant people I met at my very respectable engineering school are the people who are going to work for google, microsoft or pursuing a Ph.D.

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<p>Well, if you want to go down this road, then I would say that the most brilliant people I've ever met are not the engineers working at Google or Microsoft, or even the ones pursuing engineering PhD's. The most brilliant people I've ever met are the people pursuing PhD's in physics or mathematics. Even the engineering PhD's can't touch them. </p>

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I am sure on any given day if you find an average engineer in the US and an average management consultant in the US, the consultant is most likely the smarter one. No wonder Wall Street is doing great, while companies like GM and Ford constantly lose to its Japanese competitors in designing better cars.

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<p>Well, in fairness to the Americans, I would point out that the Japanese companies aren't exactly famous for favoring elite college grads either. For example, Toyota, Honda, and Nissan all have large facilities in the US, mostly in the South, and they do plenty of hiring from local schools. For example, ToyotaUSA, located in Georgetown, Kentucky, is a big recruiter at the University of Kentucky. Let's face it. The UoK is not exactly MIT or Stanford. </p>

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But mostly, by far, they hired grads from prestigious schools within their region. Also well represented were grads from local schools with no national reputation to speak of that were nearby and easy to recruit at.

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<p>I think that last sentence is the most telling of all. I think the truth is that a lot of engineers from the high-prestige schools just don't want to do many kinds of engineering because they see it as boring low-end work. That's why I think so many Stanford and MIT engineers would rather become consultants or bankers. Sure, all of them can get engineering jobs, but they find that they don't really want many of those jobs. In other words, an elite engineering degree has (ironically) made them overqualified for many engineering positions.</p>

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<p>ecc, never did I say that consulting was harder than engineering. The only point I was making was that the probability of getting a job at a great engineering company, while very low, is on average, higher than the chance of getting a great job at McKinsey.</p>

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The most brilliant people I've ever met are the people pursuing PhD's in physics or mathematics. Even the engineering PhD's can't touch them.

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As a double major in engineering and math, I would have to agree with this statement. I'm an EE grad student at Stanford, but I really doubt I could get into a top 10 math PhD program.</p>

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<p>I had always been casually aware that the salary differential between different schools for engineering were pretty small, but i had never seen it explicitly shown to me as in the SJSU vs Cal example. interesting stuff!</p>

<p>I have a few questions that might illustrate the consulting vs. engineering discussion into something i can understand a bit better:</p>

<p>Which job do you think is harder for a MIT (stanford, cal, etc.) engineering grad to get: a highly prestigious consulting job, say at mckinsey, or a highly prestigious engineering job, say at google or Microsoft?</p>

<p>Which do you think is harder for a MIT (stanford, cal, etc.) business/econ grad to get: a highly prestigoius consulting job, or a prestigious accounting job with a big accounting company?</p>

<p>what is the relative differential in difficulty between the two questions. like, is the difference between working at google and mckinsey is bigger/smaller than the difference between mckinsey and... umm.. arthur anderson [i don't know any accounting companies] before it collapsed?</p>

<p>entry level jobs all around, of course. i imagine the pay is all about the same (around $50,000-60,000 per year)</p>

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<p>As a point of reference, here is the data for engineers from Stanford. You can compare it to the SJSU data. Yeah, Stanford engineers get paid more, but not THAT much more.</p>

<p><a href="http://www.stanford.edu/dept/CDC/surveys/0405/engineering.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.stanford.edu/dept/CDC/surveys/0405/engineering.html&lt;/a>
<a href="http://careercenter.sjsu.edu/download/SJSU%20NACESalary%20Survey%2004%2005.pdf%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://careercenter.sjsu.edu/download/SJSU%20NACESalary%20Survey%2004%2005.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>What I find interesting is that the SJSU BS mechanical engineers are actually getting paid MORE than the Stanford BS mechanical engineers. Now I think this can be partly explained by the fact that the top Stanford ME's probably all went to graduate school, so the salaries for the Stanford BS ME's reflect the not-so-good Stanford ME's. Comparatively few SJSU engineers, even the top ones, will go to graduate school. Still, it is an indication that going to a top engineering school doesn't really translate into a significantly better starting salary. Engineering salaries tend to be highly compressed.</p>

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<p>I apologize for my previous statement about the most brilliant people. By no means had I hinted that engineering is harder than hard sciences and math. All due respect, I truly think math and physics Ph.Ds are the most brilliant people you can find. </p>

<p>In response to your statement about those Japanese car companies, I agree with you to a certain extend. These companies do have large manufacturing facilities down in the South and tend to hire regional engineering school grads to get the production going. What I meant was US is losing out in product innovation and designs. Just look at the latest car show in Detroit, Honda won all the top awards. Those engineers who design cars and implement innovative technologies aren’t the U of K engineers in Alabama. They are the Tokyo University engineers in Japan.</p>

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<p>It has been interesting to follow the arguements on this thread and I am tempted to post my response. All of your arguements are assuming that the economy will always be good and there will always be enough jobs to go around for all engineers coming out of so called "presitigious" colleges vs "no-name colleges" . Lets say, the economy goes south in the next five years and companies are cutting down on hiring and there are layoffs. In that situation who is more likely to be hired. a graduate from top 10 engineering schools or one from a no name school?</p>

<p>The same arguement goes for choosing to work for Microsoft or Google over no name company, even for same or lesser salary. A person laid off from these big brand name corporations will likely find another job more quickly than the one from a small no name company.</p>

<p>I think one should choose the best ranked college within the constraints of location, finances and personal choices.</p>

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<p>Sakky, I don't know if you realize this, but SJSU is actually ranked pretty high for its engineering (#14 among non-PHd granted schools). ecc, what do you mean by 'pretty sad' for those no-name schools grads to get a pretty good job? It almost seems to me that you're HOPING that only engineers from top-schools can be successful. Your tone makes it seem that these people don't deserve to have their jobs. </p>

<p>Great engineers are great engineers, regardless if they're MIT or New Mexico State graduates. Those people who went to no-name schools instead of top ones may be brilliant students. They might not just have the opportunity to enter top-engineering schools. To the OP, I believe that you can get a good quality of education wherever you end up going. And if it's only the matter of choosing between UCLA and UIUC (both are still considered elite schools by the way), I doubt the difference will be that much.</p>

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<p>
[quote]
What I meant was US is losing out in product innovation and designs. Just look at the latest car show in Detroit, Honda won all the top awards. Those engineers who design cars and implement innovative technologies aren’t the U of K engineers in Alabama. They are the Tokyo University engineers in Japan

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<p>I know what you mean, but even so, I don't think it's a simple matter of hiring elite engineers. After all, Toyota hires the same elite Tokyo University engineers, yet Toyota has always been reviled for designing bland cars. Extremely reliable cars, yes. But not exactly the most excitingly designed cars either. </p>

<p>I think the problems with the Big 3 US car makers is not so much that they don't hire enough elite design engineers. They hire plenty. The problem has to do with a reactionary business culture. I would say that much if not most of the blame has to fall on the United Auto Workers. In this day and age, you just cannot expect to feel entitled to get an upper middle class wage and immunity from being fired if you have only a high school diploma, yet that's exactly the kind of mentality that the UAW has fostered. I also agree that unimaginative management strategies haven't exactly helped the Big 3 either. </p>

<p>But anyway, my point is, I don't think it's quite as simple as saying that the Japanese hire better engineers and that's why they design better cars. It's actually a very complicated answer as to why the Japanese are doing better. </p>

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It has been interesting to follow the arguements on this thread and I am tempted to post my response. All of your arguements are assuming that the economy will always be good and there will always be enough jobs to go around for all engineers coming out of so called "presitigious" colleges vs "no-name colleges" . Lets say, the economy goes south in the next five years and companies are cutting down on hiring and there are layoffs. In that situation who is more likely to be hired. a graduate from top 10 engineering schools or one from a no name school?</p>

<p>The same arguement goes for choosing to work for Microsoft or Google over no name company, even for same or lesser salary. A person laid off from these big brand name corporations will likely find another job more quickly than the one from a small no name company.

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<p>Well, again, I don't think it's quite that simple. When the bust hit, it seemed that it was PRECISELY those firms that hired the superstars that laid people off the most. For example, in 2001-2002, thousands upon thousands of people from the elite management consulting firms got canned. That consisted predominantly of people with fancy degrees from Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, MIT, and schools liek that (because these are the people that elite consulting firms tend to hire in the first place). The Wall Street investment banks also laid off thousands of Harvard and Wharton and MITSloan MBA's. And of course walking around Stanford Business School during the dotcom bust was like walking through a graveyard. I believe I read somewhere how during the dotcom bust, close to 1/4 of the students from Harvard Business School and Stanford Business School were still jobless after graduation. In fact, many no-name business schools sported much higher employment rates. </p>

<p>Now, of course, I know what you're thinking - that the real problem was not that these people couldn't find jobs, but rather that they didn't want the jobs that the could get. Yep, I think that's exactly what happened. I happen to personally think this is one of the greatest dangers of an elite education. Sometimes an elite education can actually make you LESS employable because it makes you think that a wider range of jobs are now beneath you. For example, a San Jose State guy might be happy to deliver pizzas after graduation, but a Harvard graduate might not. The Harvard grad might not even personally feel bad about delivering pizzas, but he knows that other people, especially his Harvard friends, might look down on him for taking such an "unworthy" job. So instead, he chooses to take no job at all. </p>

<p>Thomas Sowell has actually written extensively about how in some countries, higher education may actually be BAD because it makes the people who get educated become highly averse to taking many kinds of jobs, and hence in some countries, especially ones in Africa and Europe, those people with college degrees are actually MORE likely to be jobless than those without degrees.</p>

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Sakky, I don't know if you realize this, but SJSU is actually ranked pretty high for its engineering (#14 among non-PHd granted schools).

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<p>I am well aware of that. However, the point is that SJSU is clearly not as prestigious as Berkeley or Stanford, and yet the salary differences are not large.</p>

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ecc, what do you mean by 'pretty sad' for those no-name schools grads to get a pretty good job? It almost seems to me that you're HOPING that only engineers from top-schools can be successful. Your tone makes it seem that these people don't deserve to have their jobs.

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<p>While I don't want to speak for ecc, I would proffer that what is sad about it is basically that top engineers don't really seem to be rewarded properly in the market. For example, Berkeley is an extremely difficult engineering school. It's extremely difficult to get into. It's extremely difficult to graduate from. You have to work hard to get into Berkeley than to get into SJSU,, and you have to work harder to graduate from Berkeley than from SJSU. However, looking at the salary surveys, a Berkeley engineer can legitimately ask why did they work so hard? They probably could have worked less hard during high school and still gotten into SJSU. Then they probably could have graduated with a SJSU engineering degree with less hard work than they have to put in to get a Berkeley engineering degree. And since the Berkeley engineers apparently don't make that much more than the SJSU engineers do, then that basically means that all that extra hard work they put in was not well rewarded. </p>

<p>And of course that just leads to a lot elite engineers giving the market the middle finger by basically saying "Ok, if engineering isn't going to properly reward my talents, then I'm going to run off to consulting or banking instead where my talents will get properly rewarded." That's why you have so many MIT, Stanford, and Berkeley engineers running off to take prestigious high-paying jobs at Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley. If you engineering firms don't reward their top talent, they are going to find somebody who will.</p>

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<p>An aside :As I read some of these threads under "engineering" I keep seeing repeated references to things like Investment banking and management consulting.</p>

<p>This strikes me as rather odd, since the vast proponderance of engineers I've met during the course of my education and work career know nothing about these fields, or if they do they are not interested in them. There are different skills required for different jobs, and all individuals do not possess all these skills in equal measure.</p>

<p>In my investment banking career we recruited engineering students from only a small number of schools. Well MIT actually, that's about it. And it had nothing to do with being engineers, we just were looking for the smartest people. But most people who handed me resumes that showed nothing but a lot of engineering courses, and there were a couple like that, just got immediately filed in the circular file. No reason for them to be here.</p>

<p>So based on this particular experience of mine, it seems like repeatedly bringing up these other fields in an engineering thread is pretty much a straw man, is it not? Based on my experiences I really can't see that it's widely relevant to the preponderance of people reading this thread. I would expect that they intend to be engineers. I mean probably some engineers become dentists too; let's start bringing that up in every thread as well?</p>

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<p>Well money of course is important but it isn't the only thing.</p>

<p>The engineering and tech grads who go into banking and financial sector: well OK the money is good but they probably have developed an interest in the subject, often thru some of the courses they take. And if they go into these fields just for the money they won't last. I think the hard core engineers or CS people will head to Google, Microsoft, Intel, Ford since that's where their interests lie. Also they may not have the communication skills (many are foreign) needed for ibanking trading or sales so theyre happy and the $ comes secondary.</p>

<p>Kind of like med school grads. Residencies in dermatology, radiology etc pay quite handsomely and can be hard to get esp from not a top med school. Still you'll have a substantial number of grads, and not the bottom of the barrel, who go into GP or ER work or public health; they may feel more like a "real" doctor, or I should say one in the trenches. They aren't the highest paid but they are aren't poor and they are doing what they want, thus they are presumably happy.</p>

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In my investment banking career we recruited engineering students from only a small number of schools. Well MIT actually, that's about it. And it had nothing to do with being engineers, we just were looking for the smartest people. But most people who handed me resumes that showed nothing but a lot of engineering courses, and there were a couple like that, just got immediately filed in the circular file. No reason for them to be here.

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<p>Well, by that logic, the investment banks should have also tossed away the applicants whose transcripts showed a lot of History classes. Or Archaeology classes. Or Art classes. No reason for these people to be in banking either. At least you can say that engineering is quantitative and so has some applicability to making financial calculations. What the heck do a bunch of painting classes and pottery classes have to do with anything ? Yet I've seen people like that get offers. </p>

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So based on this particular experience of mine, it seems like repeatedly bringing up these other fields in an engineering thread is pretty much a straw man, is it not? Based on my experiences I really can't see that it's widely relevant to the preponderance of people reading this thread. I would expect that they intend to be engineers. I mean probably some engineers become dentists too; let's start bringing that up in every thread as well?

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<p>First off, I would posit that plenty of engineers from Stanford, Berkeley, Princeton, and Cornell seem to be pretty darn successful in becoming bankers.</p>

<p>Secondly, I keep raising the issue for a simple reason - why is it that the engineering industry can't hang on to so many of its top engineering graduates? Here we are with all these politicians and business leaders whining about how the US doesn't produce enough engineering talent to meet the challenge from China and India, and how American kids need to be more interested in studying math and science, and then I see all these top engineers from MIT and Stanford leaving engineering for other fields like banking and consulting. Why do they do it? Because they think they can make more money doing it, they can advance their careers faster, and there is more prestige in doing it. So then that begs the question of why can't the engineering industry create positions that pay equivalently well and can advance your careers equivalently quickly. So on the one hand, the companies are complaining that the US isn't producing enough top engineers talent, and on the other hand, we have top engineers coming out of MIT and Stanford who leave engineering for better offers elsewhere. </p>

<p>Heck, I remember talking to a guy who had just completed his engineering PhD from MIT in less than 3 years. Clearly this is one of the most brilliant engineers in the world. But where is he working now? McKinsey. What's wrong with this picture? </p>

<p>So we have all these corporate leaders talking about how the US needs to produce more top engineering talent. But when push comes to shove and it comes time to actually try to make competitive job offeres to these people, they aren't willing to belly up to the bar. That's why so many of them leave engineering. Basically, they want top engineers, but they don't want to pay for them. It doesn't work that way. That's basic economics. </p>

<p>Again, from what I've seen, engineering is really really good for the lower-end students. To make 55k coming out of New Mexico Tech is a really sweet deal. But engineering is not so good if you're a star. That's why so many MIT engineers don't want to work as engineers. Again, in the MIT EECS department, about 1/4 of all graduates take jobs in consulting or banking. I would estimate that another 1/4 wanted to do that but didn't get an offer. Hence, that's 1/2 of the class that wants to leave engineering. Think about that. MIT is the most prestigious engineering school in the world, and EECS is the most prestigious department in MIT. Yet within that department, anywhere from 1/4 to 1/2 of the students would rather not work as engineers. What's wrong with this picture? I have the feeling that you will find the same thing at Stanford - a significant percentage of engineering students don't want to work as engineers.</p>

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<p>1) a trivial percentage of engineering students are heading to MIT or Stanford, and the vast majority of the rest of them will never be offered the choiceds you are positing.</p>

<p>2) Frankly I feel sorry for all those people who study engineering for four years and then immediately abandon it. They have essentially wasted their irreplaceable undergraduate study years studying subjects they were not that interested in. IT's a tough subject to be studying for nothing.</p>

<p>3) I believe engineering is poor training for investment banking,. or for general management. It is probably good training for "making financial calculations", as you say, but this is a low-level support activity. The best bankers I know were liberal arts majors. These individuals could look at the big picture. They could lead. They could read well and write persuasive proposals. They could think outside the box. They could put together and excel at social events that were needed for business development. Engineering training is not helpful to any of these, and it is counter to a few of them.</p>

<p>The best liberal arts majors are every bit as good quantititavely as most engineers. They just choose a more general path because they are smarter verbally, more socially oriented and not that interested in the little picture things that engineers focus on.</p>

<p>The head of my quant group at the I bank had been a social sciences major from HYP. He scored 800 on his math SATs. And his verbal SATs too, I believe. He is brilliant. The best analyst I had working for me was an anthropology major, I believe. We did a ton of quantitatively oriented work, in addition to written proposals that required superior verbal skills.</p>

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<p>Which area of investment banking do you work in? Investment banking proper is quite different from prop trading, for example, even though both are commonly referred as "investment banking."</p>