<p>Well, I don't know. I guess it depends on how you are defining 'small'. Many of the elite consulting firms are fairly small. So are many of the investment banks and financial services firms. Lazard, for example, has only about 2000 employees. Private equity firms, hedge funds, and venture capital firms are rarely larger than 1000 people. Frankly, I think we can agree that it's more desirable to work for one of these companies than to work for, say, Ford. Especially nowadays. Private equity employees are raking in fat paydays. Meanwhile Ford employees are seeing their salaries and benefits slashed and the overall workforce reduced precipitously.</p>
<p>Slipper, Wash U hasn't been on the national radar like some of the Ivy schools in the top ten. Give it a few years, maybe even ten and I think you will see a difference in grad school placement. Barron offers one valid reason why their numbers might not be so high but your dismissal of his comment makes me think that you might be unaware of midwesterners' attitudes about their own schools. </p>
<p>You keep mentioning grad school placement and recruiting as "your" rationale for Wash U being underrated. US news uses a lot more criteria and the original poster made a general query as to why Wash U is considered overrated so it's hardly inappropriate to talk about new buildings, endowments and professors in the discussion of what makes Wash U worthy of it's position. If grad school placement is anything like undergrad admissions from unknown public schools, then it's no surprise that there wouldn't be near the placement of Wash U students at top grad schools as there are from Ivy league schools that have been on the national radar for CENTURIES not decades!</p>
<p>I totally agree that WashU isn't on the national radar like the Ivies and others like Duke. On the surface WashU is very close to those other schools and I agree one day it will increase its reputation which will bring all the benefits of the Ivies to its students. But someone signing up to go to WashU should be aware that there's a strong chance that they won't get some of the benefits of their Ivy counterparts for now. Schools like Duke and Stanford both increased their national profiles significantly and I bet WashU will too. But for now its not in that league.</p>