Do the posters discussing all the nitty-gritty of RSUs and their tax implications want to spin off a separate thread?
Because that is not the topic of this thread.
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My point is that college is too expensive, and some are worse than others when starting salaries are considered. It was incorrect for me to assume that Ivy outcomes would be better right out of the gate, especially in STEM fields.
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At many firms including my own the compensation package doesnāt change based on which school an applicant is coming from. We test rigorously for certain technical skills, as well as many soft skills. Once you pass that (high) bar and get an offer itās going to be the same regardless of whether youāre coming from Stanford or Stony Brook.
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In some technical fields, Stanford and Stony Brook are comparable.
I think the better comparison would be Stanford and U New Havenā¦ or Stanford and Stonehill?
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This was true back when I entered the job market after college eons ago. I started at the same time with the same pay and title as another person who had just graduated Yale. I was a lowly Brooklyn College CUNY graduate. He kept saying (until realizing it fell on deaf ears), but I went to Yale!
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I think a lot of folks claim: āAt my company, hires from EliteU and StateU get the same pay package.ā
That could very well be true, AND EliteU grads make more on average (to start, let alone 5/10/20 years down the line).
I would assume that at many of the better paying companies, EliteU grads have an edge (maybe a strong one) in getting in the door. Yes, a few StateU grads may also get hired, but thatās a much harder path.
CompanyX pays their 10 EliteU new grads the same as the 10 from StateU (a generous $120K, say).
But StateUs (several of them) in the recruiting area graduate 5-20x as many people in the recruited majors as EliteUs, so your odds of getting past the various filters are likely much better from EliteU.
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To my point above about Cornell starting salaries, it looks like EliteU grads donāt make more to start.
My son graduated from a āTop 200ā state university in May. He had two jobs to choose from. He went with the lower paying job, but with better advancement opportunites. Heās in training now, but making more than the mean starting salaries for Cornell Civil Engineering and Physics degree holders. Itās not a white collar job. It certainly isnāt a STEM job. When heās done with training heāll make Cornell CS money. He will get a guaranteed annual raise, plus performance/seniority salary increases starting in year 3.
My son isnāt a unicorn. His job is something many people could pursue if they were so inclined. Thatās why I was so surprised by the starting salary information reported above.
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There are many confounding factors. For example, are you comparing 2 grads who interview at the same company, have similar experience backgrounds + skill sets, and get similar marks on interviews? If so, Iād expect them to generally get similar offers, regardless if one is from EliteU and the other StateU.
However, the state U and elite U kids often do not apply to the same companies. In general, state U kids are for more likely to apply to in-state companies; and elite U kids are more likely to apply to companies perceived as elite. They also often get different marks in interviews. Kids attending highly selective colleges (not just āeliteā colleges) are generally more likely to ace technical interviews than kids who struggled academically and were rejected from more selective colleges due to worse academic performance.
That said, if you look at actual starting salaries, there is often only small differences āeliteā colleges and less selective colleges in engineering as well as many other fields ā too small to assume that the difference in salary relates to school name rather than differences in the typical individual students attending the respective colleges. Outliers with larger differences include ones associated with āeliteā finance, such as economics and to a lesser extent mathematics. CS starting salaries also shows a larger correlation with college selectivity than typical. Some example numbers are below for engineering, from an earlier College Scorecard analysis (see previous posts for discussion and more detail about limitations).
T20 = non-Ivy, USNWR ranked 1 to 20
T50 = USNWR ranked 21 to 50
Major Ivies T20 T50 Pri T50 Pub All
Mechanical Engineering $71k $72k $66k $66k $63k
Engineering (All Majors) $70k $73k $69k $67k $63k
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As it should. The problem is that some firms either donāt have the internal resources (or too lazy?) to test their applicants, so they effectively outsource certain functions to the colleges, hoping those collegesā admission criteria can do the trick for them.
I am speaking from first hand experience here so itās not just hearsay. My organization makes dozens of offers globally each year (tech jobs) and as its leader I know what our comp packages look like.
It depends on the industry. Some like IB are pedigree sensitive - the Big Tech firms arenāt. Also āeliteā vs āstateā is not a good comparison for CS and engineering because many public flagships are much stronger than the Ivies and many firms specifically seek out grads from those public Us.
In other countries where we hire - like in India and China - the school makes a big difference because of substantial differences in rigor and breadth of curriculum between the elites and non-elites. Here in the US it really doesnāt matter.
Iāll also add that for experienced roles (2/3+ years out of college) which school an applicant went to makes 0 difference. At that point itās the applicantās skills, experience and attitude that get them the job.
Iām not sure itās the difference in curricula, rather than in the quality of students. Students in IIT or Tsinghua have been selected in a process thatās arguably much more rigorous and meritocratic.
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However, if there is no difference in curricula, then hiring based on college name is hiring college graduates based on their high school achievements.
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Yes, but not everyone wants to be a police officer.
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Congrats to your son - sounds promising.
That said, ānot a white collar jobā often corresponds to a shallower salary curve, over oneās career. i.e. There are various professions where one can earn ~$60K+/year as a 22 year old with no college degree, but many of them top out closer at, say, ~$100K, whereas a lot of college grad careers go well past that.
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I think for some firms, itās just being efficient.
Itās highly efficient for banking and consulting firms to simply have target schools where they recruit on-campus. Anyone can apply from anywhere, but focusing on-campus recruiting efforts at schools where students have already been vetted by high standards just makes sense.
Agreed, but more might, if they realized they could be compensated better than Ivy grads.
True. The assumption is that better students in high school are much more likely to remain better students in college. Itās not a bad assumption even though thereāre obviously exceptions.
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At the risk of incurring the wrath of many posters here - I think this is more applicable in other countries because of what @1NJParent mentioned:
Based on 2+ decades of hiring experience, I cannot say the same of our āeliteā schools here in the US. Of course, they attract many of the best and brightest students but they also consider many factors in admissions that are of no concern to colleges abroad (like athletics, filling a niche institutional need, etc) or do not directly relate to skills in the job market. So āvetted by high standardsā doesnāt always apply when a firm is looking for candidates with certain skillsets. We (as a firm) have learned we get the best candidates when we cast a wide net.
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To add insult to injury, that tax has to be paid even if the company fails. My son is going through this exercise as we speak. You risk losing the cost to exercise and the tax on the differential between the strike price and declared value at the time. 
Itās a good reason for a boutique firm, but probably not a good reason for a large firm. IME, thereāre several other reasons in addition to the one you mentioned above:
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These firms are full of graduates of the elite schools, and their hiring managers have natural affinity and familiarity with the elite schools; and
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These firms are in the relationship business. Graduates of elite schools have social networks that are more valuable to these firms.
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