Elite M.B.A. Programs Report Steep Drop in Applications

WSJ ^ | 3 Nov 2019 | Chip Cutter

[oblomov]

Applications to some of America’s most elite business schools fell at a steeper rate this year, as universities struggled to attract international students amid changes to immigration policies and political tensions between the U.S. and China.

The declines affected some of the nation’s top-rated programs, with Harvard University, Stanford University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, among others, all reporting larger year-over-year drops in business-school applications. Some, such as Dartmouth College’s Tuck School of Business, posted double-digit percentage declines.

Overall, applications to American M.B.A. programs fell for the fifth straight year, according to new data from the nonprofit Graduate Management Admission Council, an association of business schools that administers the GMAT admissions test. In the latest academic cycle ended this spring, U.S. business schools received 135,096 applications for programs including the traditional master of business administration degree, down 9.1% from the prior year, according to an annual survey. Last year applications for U.S. business programs were down 7%.

The M.B.A. was once considered de rigueur for anyone wanting to join the management ranks of U.S. companies, especially for international students, offering a pathway to leadership and a bigger payday. But education experts say shifts in U.S. immigration policy, trade and political tensions with China, as well as the growing attractiveness of technology-industry jobs that don’t require M.B.A. degrees, have recently dampened foreign students’ enthusiasm for business school.

[oblomov]

The higher education bubble begins deflating...

[Balding_Eagle]

Doesn’t AOC have an MBA?

Maybe she should become an advocate.

[montag813]

GOOD! We need to stop educating Chinese corporate spies.

[MIchaelTArchangel]

MBA ==> Master of Bullsh!t and Adminstration

I can count on the fingers of one hand those MBAs I have know who has a mastery of anything other than his or her self-worth.

[xkaydet65]

They are overemphasizing China and other foreigners. Reality is not many gender studies, Fine arts, post modern Language Studies,majors are not likely to seek a stiff grad school curricula like an MBA.

[rollo tomasi]

No, she has a liberal arts degree in international relations and business.
Her business side if the curriculum contained hardly any math that traditional business degrees require.

[Track9]

Imagine if American universities had an economic interest in American kids getting excellent primary education. They’d become the enemy of the teacher’s unions instead of the globalist vultures they are.

[wildcard_redneck]

Well they should enroll more Americans now.

[rollo tomasi]

Yeah! A lot of assembly jobs can due the quantitative analysis and calculus required to optimize processes and systems. Not!
There is a reason why productivity has exploded, a lot had to do with those MBAs despite government interference.

[yesthatjallen]

But education experts say shifts in U.S. immigration policy, trade and political tensions with China, as well as the growing attractiveness of technology-industry jobs that don’t require M.B.A. degrees, have recently dampened foreign students’ enthusiasm for business school.

Note how they put "growing attractiveness of technology-industry jobs that don’t require M.B.A. degrees" last on the list.

It should be first because it is the trend indicator.

All the others are smokescreens to blame Trump.

[Reily]

Pretty sure its a BA.

[Old Yeller]

Pretty sure its a BA.

Pretty sure it's a B.S.

[Hot Tabasco]

I can count on the fingers of one hand those MBAs I have know who has a mastery of anything other than his or her self-worth.

I can add to it on my left hand.......

I had the misfortune of spending the last 9 years of my employment with my company that was a Tier I supplier to the auto industry, at the corporate office. I had transferred there from our Detroit stamping plant.

With the exception of my co-peons, management were nothing but a clique of anal-retentive jerks who looked down on the employees in the plants that kept the corporate jobs intact.

I hated leaving the plant and my friends in 1997 to transfer to the corporate offices but my job was critical to corporate. So pressure was put on me by the plant HR mgr. who said if I didn't transfer to corporate I would likely be laid off........So, I had no choice.

[CincyRichieRich]

Probably because we have more manufacturing and we need more hourly people making things i.e., not pushing paper around. I think a focus manufacturing and having more products and services is requiring those positions that do not require mbas.

[Clutch Martin]

MBA as a 2nd degree makes for impressive resume bullets. I got my EE first, and then later on I got an MBA so I could do Project work subcontract for primary contractors. I have been told a number of times that my selection to Projects was based on the fact that I not only had the EE but I also have the MBA.

Have I used my MBA? Not really. And if I were to choose a concentration in business I think I could do fairly well in corporate level advertising, but the drawback is relocating to cities where large advertisement firms are located and I have no desire to move to any of those cities where the premium employers were headquartered.

If I had to do it all over again, rather than an MBA as a second-degree I might have chosen English, because no matter where you work at a certain level you’re doing a lot of writing unless you’re in the trades.

I was in the trades, but when I started getting up in years, busting butt everyday is hard on the physiology. So I literally had to go hunt down a cube job, and for the 15 years that I worked in a cube it was the worst part of my entire working career. As a result I absolutely loathe Cube Farms and when some young working stiff ask me about certain jobs and they’re looking at Cube related work I let them know, just how badly working in a cube sucks.

I try to mentor as many people as I can into the electrical trades, because electricians will always have work. And starting salaries are pretty good for electricians.

[DoodleBob]

Um, Trump has an MBA. I also doubt, while he isn't averse to getting his hands dirty, that he was handling concrete and rebar as often as he was handling paper.

The decline in MBA applications likely has more to do with the relative value of that degree vs working in tech start ups or more STEM-driven sectors vs immigration etc. But the commentary herein..well.. I never quite understood how normally reasonable humans become triggered by the mention of an MBA.

Sure, there are dumb MBA-holders....and dumb blue collar workers, and dumb engineers, dumb IT people, dumb journalists and dumb teachers. As Zappa said, there is more stupidity than hydrogen in the universe, and it has a longer shelf life. But frankly, I've never seen an overindexing of stupidity amongst MBAs.

What I HAVE seen, is a nation of many people with a variety of backgrounds that make up 4% of the global population but producing 24% of global GDP. We are a nation of doers- blue collar and white collar workers, MBAs and doctorates and bachelor's and trade schools and craftsmen and dropout outs who don't understand the meaning of the word QUIT.

That is the essence of Deplorablism..it is the Dems who push the class warfare idea that some people are better than others.

[Mr Rogers]

I got my MBA while in the military. It didn’t teach me the square root of a dog turd, but it filled a square for promotion. A lot of hours spent working on something that added no value to my ability or knowledge.

[CincyRichieRich]

I really don’t need a lecture on MBAs. I almost got an MBA myself. And run a small business. I was not insulting MBAs. Can you show me and my post where I insulted MBA’s I only said that there is a need for more hourly employees right now with the need for products and services rather than any management types. When I said paper pushers I really meant all manager types and by the way I have been a senior manager as well as a project manager in the past so I was in that class of people as well. Sorry that I offended you. No. I said sorry that I did not if I did.

[Terry L Smith]

MBA’s are useful in the corporate world, until they have to downsize. Then, an MBA makes the now job seeker, overqualified.

[DoodleBob]

not pushing paper aroundwasn't clarified, leaving the implication that MBAs don't add value. Thanks for the clarity, and no offense was taken.

I am pleased to see signs of a manufacturing Renaissance in the USA. In that realm, I would agree that too many managers and not enough doers is a bad mix. But leading a group of people isn't an easy job. They work like a hand and a glove.

My point was that many people, who (rightly) detest journalists that pontificate about this class being smarter and better than that unwashed lot over there, wield the same bromide when the letters MBA enter a discussion.

Thanks again.