<p>I just transfered to UT and chose economics as my major. i like economics a lot but i´ve been hearing the business school is amazing and very prestigous.</p>
<p>You guys think an internal transfer to McCombs( Finance) will improve my chances of getting into a top MBA program and landindg a better job.</p>
<p>are economists from UT seen as rejects from the busines school?</p>
<p>First, do what you interested in. You’ll do better in the classes if you have a genuine interest in them. </p>
<p>Economics is, to my knowledge, not seen as a home for business rejects. The economics department is highly ranked as well at 25th in the nation. Not as high as the business majors but still very respectable.</p>
<p>“Economics is, to my knowledge, not seen as a home for business rejects.”</p>
<p>Yes it is. You don’t go to McCombs to learn about business. You go to McCombs to get recruited by an S&P 500 company and learn from them.</p>
<p>There are very likely some people doing economics whose first choice was business. And there are likely some people who are doing economics because they prefer economics to business.</p>
<p>I fall in the latter camp. I had the credentials to be competitive for business, but I realized quickly that I did not enjoy business education and probably didn’t want the kind of career McCombs students shoot for. I did, however, really enjoy economics and I felt that the marginal benefit of going to a division of the university that is more heavily recruited was not worth the large cost of doing something I did not enjoy. </p>
<p>Now, are you dead set against graduate school? Are you dying to get into banking or consulting as a career? If your answer to either question is yes, then you might want to go for McCombs. The probability of landing a banking or consulting job is higher with McCombs. In 2010, 34% of McCombs graduates went into investment banking or consulting. I don’t know how many economics graduates went into consulting or investment banking, but I can guarantee it was less than that.</p>
<p>So a lot of it depends on your career goals and personality type. Do you see yourself as strictly a businessman type in the future? Can you handle the cutthroat nature of business school and post-business school life? Do you want great pay, but don’t mind working long- I mean very long- hours to earn it?</p>
<p>Or do you see yourself in a profession related to law, philosophy, the natural sciences, or the social sciences? Like say maybe, being a lawyer, a doctor, a computer scientist, or an economist? Or maybe you see yourself in education or social work and don’t put a high value on monetary wealth? If you want a profession outside of traditional business career paths, then graduate school will be a must. You will be trading off short-term pains for long-term gains, assuming you are pursuing what you are interested in and the pay-off is there at the end. Although the business world can be very cutthroat, many Phd or MD programs are extremely competitive as well, and the workload can be very large.</p>
<p>Also keep in mind that in order to move up in the business world you will likely need an MBA in the future. It is less of a time commitment than a phd or MD (2-3 years to 5-6 years), but much more expensive. Sometimes an MBA student can get reimbursed by their employer for the cost of the degree, but many times they will be paying well over 100K out of pocket. In contrast, no rational person would dream of doing a 5-6 year phd program without full, or close to full, financial aid support from their sponsoring department. So although the time cost of a phd is a lot, the monetary cost, consisting of the salary the person gives up by being in school instead of working full-time, is offset by the fact that MBA students often leave school with >100K in debt, as well as the fact that phd students usually have their tuition waived and are given a stipend, which is a fancy way of saying a small salary to live on while studying.</p>
<p>MD and law students are not so lucky. They often leave school with more debt than the MBA students, and law students are currently venturing out into a world of uncertainty when it comes to the job market. </p>
<p>I would start with the question of what it is you truly want to do with your life. What do you want to accomplish and remembered for? If you can answer, or come close to answering that question, then your mind should be made up quite easily.</p>