<p>just trying to figure out some top paying careers besides medicine? Any suggestions? I'd like to make at least $100K/year, or more! :) Thanks</p>
<p>forensic accounting is a field where $100K or more is highly likely, but you have to specialize and be a good expert witness for large law firms.</p>
<p>swz.salary.com</p>
<p>pretty good reference for salaries in various fields</p>
<p>I can't find hedge fund managers salaries on that site? Anyone know approximately how much they make?</p>
<p>According to that the career I want should make $71,939 - $94,768 with the average being $85,110 where I live... Good, then maybe I can pay off the 8 years of college education!</p>
<p>Lets talk about that forbidden 17 letter word, everyone's favorite career.</p>
<p>And also that 12 letter word.</p>
<p>YES, I'M TALKING ABOUT INVESTMENT BANKING. </p>
<p>YEAH, YOU GUESSED IT, CORPORATE LAW.</p>
<p>I want to be a veterinarian, does that count as medicine</p>
<p>only if the animals you treat live.</p>
<p>//only if the animals you treat live.//</p>
<p>hahahahahaha. that was hilarious.</p>
<p>I think you really want to know what a hedge fund analyst makes.. a hedge fund manager is the top guy at a hedge fund and makes between 500K and 1 billion a year.</p>
<p>i heard most people who work at hedge funds have phds.</p>
<p>Yeah, but you don't neccessarily need one (except at RenTech which pretty much only takes physics phds)</p>
<p>so who do hedge funds usually hire? math/engineering majors from ivies?</p>
<p>Yeah, they'll hire the best Math/EE/Comp Sci majors from MIT/Harvard/Caltech/Stanford/Berkeley; you need a strong comp sci background either way</p>
<p>Won't it be harder to land a job if you don't have a PhD. Because the other people who are applying may have PhD's and if you don't theres practically no chance your going to be chosen over them</p>
<p>it depends on the hedge fund, fusion. It's not uncommon for them to hire undergrads; its more about how smart you are, unless your phd is in financial modelling I guess</p>
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i heard most people who work at hedge funds have phds.
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<p>No way. The vast majority will just have MBA's, and a significant number will just have undergrad degrees. </p>
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Yeah, they'll hire the best Math/EE/Comp Sci majors from MIT/Harvard/Caltech/Stanford/Berkeley; you need a strong comp sci background either way
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Won't it be harder to land a job if you don't have a PhD. Because the other people who are applying may have PhD's and if you don't theres practically no chance your going to be chosen over them
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<p>No, you don't 'need' a strong compsci background and you don't need a PhD. Keep in mind that most hedge fund managers are not actually DOING the modeling. Most hedge fund managers are basically salesmen. </p>
<p>To give you an idea, consider the backgrounds of some of the top hedge fund managers in the world. T. Boone Pickens has an undergrad degree in geology and spent his early years as an oil wildcatter. Steven Cohen has an undergrad business degree from Wharton and started off as an options trader. Paul T. Jones has an econ undergrad degree from Virginia and started his career in the family business as an investment consultant. Steve Feinberg has a political science degree from Princeton, and started off as a trader for Drexel. Bruce Kovner has a degree in government from Harvard and started off as a trader. Eddie Lampert studied economics at Yale and worked in risk arbitrage at Goldman Sachs. None of these guys have PhD's or any sort of serious computing or engineering background. </p>
<p>Now granted, there are some hedge fund guys that do have extensive technical backgrounds, notably James Simons and D.E. Shaw. But the point is, most of them don't have it, and they seem to be doing fine anyway. </p>
<p>I also wish it were true that the hedge funds would always hire the best math/EE/CS guys from MIT/Stanford/Berkeley/Harvard/Caltech. But this is not always true. Hedge funds will often times not hire such people, preferring to hire the shmoozy smooth operator who may not be technically savvy, but who has the ability to socialize and (more importantly) who can sell. Just because you're good with numbers and computing doesn't mean that you're a good salesman and businessman, and hedge funds has a lot to do with selling, because you have to sell your fund to investors to obtain capital. There's a big difference between having the right answer and being able to convince others that you have the right answer. That's where salesmanship and marketing come into play. </p>
<p>Look, if you want to get into hedge funds, you will probably have to get into some finance job as an investment banker and trader and then jump over the hedge funds after you've gotten some solid banking experience. That's how most people get in today. Going for a PhD for the express purpose of getting into hedge funds is a highly risky strategy. You may spend all that time getting the PhD, and STILL not be able to get into the industry.</p>
<p>It is true to some extent what Sakky says; but I think that joining a hedge fund full of salesmen is a risky way to spend your time. Good sales person or not, you're still trying to arb the market..</p>
<p>Then that would basically rule out almost every single hedge fund in the market. Practically every single fund out there is composed largely of sales guys, and in many cases, is actually composed MOSTLY of sales guys. You can't arb the market if you don't have any capital, and you can't get capital unless you can sell your fund to investors. There's a big difference between being able to design the next great market hedge model and being able to convince investors that you have the next great market hedge model. Just because you have the right answer doesn't mean that people are gong to believe you. </p>
<p>But I don't mean to harp on sales guys specifically. I'm simply making the point that most hedge fund people actually don't have technical academic backgrounds, and certainly not PhD's. Of the top 10 earning hedge fund managers in 2005 according to Trader Monthly magazine, only 2 of them held PhD's. Heck, some of them didn't even major in anything particularly quantitiative (i.e. poli-sci and government are NOT quantitative disciplines). Most of them got their knowledge via real-world trading and deal-making. Most of them worked as regular Wall Street traders or investment bankers before getting into hedge funds.</p>