<p>For those of you that have graduated with the BS Econ from Wharton, how different is finding a job that's not with a BB, PE, or consulting firm?</p>
<p>Does a BS Econ from Wharton act more like a BBA or BA Econ for potential employers? I'm asking this because I am pretty interested in business, but I'm not sure if I want to work on Wall Street or in consulting. Does the Wharton degree open significantly more windows (pre-MBA) than a business, econ, or engineering degree from a top 15-20 school?</p>
<p>Check out the career surveys of Wharton Undergrad's last five graduating classes (2003-2007), and you'll see exactly where they ended up:</p>
<p>Career</a> Services, University of Pennsylvania</p>
<p>Much more accurate and comprehensive than the few anecdotal or impressionistic responses you'll get here.</p>
<p>People generally go to the highest bidder and I-banks and consulting usually pay best, so they get the bulk of the graduates. Other industries would love to get their hands on Wharton grads but they can't afford to match the pay.</p>
<p>Some of the places that hire Wharton grads also hire people with econ degrees and business degrees from other schools, so they are somewhat interchangeable, but Wharton is ranked #1 in business so you are at the top of the pile. Engineering is a whole different career track.</p>
<p>45 Percenter, thanks for the link. It was awesome.</p>
<p>Percy Skivins, I know engineering is a whole different degree. I know that some engineering majors go on to work in the financial realm, rather than actually be an engineer. I'm sorry I wasn't really clear about that in my questions. I know that a lot of CEOs and upper management people in the corporate sector tend to have undergrad engineering degrees (usually from schools that aren't in the top 5-10 for engineering). I was wondering how this compares to a BS Econ from UPenn. Is that clear?</p>
<p>I think you could dig for hours to try to find some kind of connection between undergraduate degree and CEO's, and I think you could try to pull something up, but do keep in mind that so many other factors matter so much more at that point. </p>
<p>Wharton degrees are very well respected, and they certainly open doors at banks, in finance jobs, and in consulting companies. An Ivy League degree may no longer be the hook in CEO decisions, but experience at those top banks and consulting companies is increasingly common among top CEOs. </p>
<p>A Wharton degree is much more powerful than business or econ at "top 20" schools. It's only marginally more meaningful than econ or engineering degrees at the other Ivy schools, along with choice few others. (Stanford, econ at Chicago, eng. at MIT) This is an area where traditions and alumni matter, and many of these top Wall st. jobs really only do recruit at <em>ivy</em> schools.</p>
<p>If you're interested in business, a Wharton degree is a wonderful experience. The only people I know here who are dissatisfied are those who wish they would have studied engineering or some kind of science - they feel like Wharton isn't academic or deep enough. However, come recruiting time, those people always get very quiet... For someone who isn't decisively interested in a theoretical econ degree or a quantitative engineering degree, I think Wharton's a great program.</p>
<p>"I know that a lot of CEOs and upper management people in the corporate sector tend to have undergrad engineering degrees (usually from schools that aren't in the top 5-10 for engineering)."</p>
<p>You are reasoning backwards - out of 1000 graduates of these non-top-10 engineering schools, how many will become CEOs of a major corp? 1 or 2? In some companies the road to the top runs thru the operating (technical) side. But out of all the thousands of engineers hired, only a handful will break out of the technical side and make it into upper management .</p>
<p>And promotion from the ranks to the very top is increasingly rare - at the very least the engineer interested in management will probably have to go back to school for an MBA at some point, because the skills needed to run a large organization are better taught in a school setting instead of being picked up "on the job" where mistakes are expensive.</p>