MBA graduates from top schools like the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School of Business, face higher unemployment rates than the general workforce.
Business-school graduates face a stark future.
The unemployment rate for recent grads from the top 30 MBA programs was 16.5 percent, according to a survey by BusinessWeek. The survey was based on employment questionnaires collected by the schools from graduates actively looking for work three months after graduation.
Last year that was true of just 5 percent of students. And despite the meteoric rise of salaries over the past several years, starting pay was down this year for the top 30, dipping from roughly $98,000 in 2008 to $96,500.
Roxanne Hori, Assistant Dean at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, has been involved with MBA programs for 14 years, said it “is the worst we’ve seen.”
Washington University’s Olin School of Business fared the best, reporting only 8 percent of students without a job offer three months after graduation. Olin students were less focused on Wall Street financial services and consulting firms, and focused on growing fields like pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, school officials told BusinessWeek.
(Image by scumgodsteev via Flickr CC 3.0)
More on hiring for business schools and MBA jobs:
- One-Year MBA Program Graduates Have One Disadvantage
- The Hiring and Salary Freeze Begins to Thaw
- Finding Jobs in Emerging Markets
[...] (ages 20-24) it is about 10.5%, which exceeds the already-soaring national average. According to career-line.com, the unemployment rate for recent grads of top MBA programs was 16.5% at the end of 2009 (up from [...]