Posted on 11/03/2019 12:11:17 PM PST by 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.
(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...
The Education Industry is corrupt - they deserve to go under.
The Education Industry is corrupt - they deserve to go under. May this be the start of many failures...
“the relative value of that degree vs working in tech start ups or more STEM-driven sectors”
In good times, smart folks are too busy earning.
When the econmoy sours, theyll go back to learning and wait it out.
Fwiw- a positive take: it means there are slots currently available to folks who might otherwise NOT normally make the cut.
MBA are good at protecting each other. In a dying company they will be there right up until the $$ is all gone. They’ll lay off the productive workers first.
How many Directors of Innovation, VPs of Communication, VPs of Mission Related Services ever got laid off?
Every one of those managers relied on their employees to do the necessary work for them.
As a side note, with the company I worked for, I was responsible for administering the company's UAW pension plan for our workers. After the close of our Philadelphia plant, that function was transferred to our corporate office and I was transferred there from our Detroit plant in 1997.
With the exception of one of the benefits managers who I worked for, I was the only person who understood and could interpret the UAW pension contract that incorporated over 45 years of contract negotiations and apply it to any questions that any past employee or retiree had to offer........
The knowledge I had was specific to my job and there is not an MBA grad or PHD grad that could ever match that........and I was just the lowly non educated employee that was there to handle the problems..........
So yea, MBA's are nothing but a piece of paper that is just a feather in the cap for promotions.......
Yep! Seen it so many times...these overeducated know nothing hotshots come.in, hire expensive consultants whonknow nothing, lay everyone off, reorg...on and on and turn companies to shi+
Oh, come now, there are many very soft MBA programs out there.
MBAs suffer from the representative examples of business bachelors and MBA backer. Those that learn something first, then learn business after see both sides. Real world and finance/accounting.
Trump’s kids learned construction, then moved into the business side of the biz.
Trump is a very smart man.
Me too.
Nobody has ever asked if I had an MBA, but for project work it gives you credibility but I also learned a lot about getting stuff done.
In Downeast Maine it is getting more difficult to find young men and women in the trades-electricans and plumbers in particular. The Maine Maritime Academy in Castine, Maine has two degress in Power Engineering: Power Engineering Technology (ABET accredited) and Power Engingeering Operations. Both degrees require at least two three month COOPs with a power plant or paper mill. About one half of the PET and PEO seniors have firm job offers with salaries in the mid 60s with opportunities for overtime. Many of these student minor in business and take accounting, economics, and finance courses after being encouraged by their mentors in the work place.
I've also worked with plenty of people with the MBA who are outstanding businessmen (and businesswomen). Do I think the MBA made them smarter? Not really... most of these people were driven in the first place.
The only place I've ever seen a degree really make a difference is at the baccalaureate and doctoral levels. Master's degrees tend to be lovely parting gifts for those who fail their comps, or (as you note) people who are earning an extra stripe. Where MBAs do excel, is where they integrate their learning by taking business problems and solving them or - better yet - turning them into money.
Pauline Kael famously said after the 1972 election: "I live in a rather special world. I only know one person who voted for Nixon." Maybe you and I live in special worlds where MBAs are "nothing but a piece of paper that is just a feather in the cap for promotions" or where they tend to be driven businesspeople.
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.
..
Excellent discussion and glad to have it. My dad worked at General Electric for 39 years I had seven patents in the nuclear fuel rod manufacturing arena. And about the time he retired in the late 90s before he died he said that we don’t make anything ever anymore we just push money around. I wish he was alive to see this big turn around now he would be pretty happy
Plumbing. You don’t need an M,B,A to learn plumbing. And plumbers can make a ton of money.
Mediocre But Arrogant
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