At Harvard University, a graduating senior who transferred his full scholarship to another school showed his parents that the $400,000 he invested in his Harvard education meant he could get a lucrative job. He said he felt a lot of pressure to do so. Millions of dollars a year. He plans to join the private equity firm Blackstone after graduation, where he believes he can learn and accomplish more in six years than he could in 30 years at a public service-oriented organization.
Another student from Uruguay, who spent two consecutive summers practicing case studies in preparation for a management consulting internship interview, said everyone arrived on campus hoping to change the world. But what you learn at Harvard, he says, is that it's too hard to actually do anything meaningful. He told me that people give up on their dreams and think about making money. Others said it's common at parties to hear peers say they just want to sell out.
“There's definitely a herd mentality,” said Joshua Parker, 21, a Harvard junior from Oahu. “If you don't work in finance or technology, you might feel like you're doing something wrong.”
In his freshman year, he planned to major in environmental engineering. In his sophomore year, he transferred to the economics department, joining five of his six roommates. One of his roommates said he wanted to run a hedge fund by his 30s. Before that, he wanted to have a good salary, which he defined as $500,000 a year.
According to a Harvard Crimson survey of Harvard seniors, the percentage of 2023 graduates who are employed in the finance or consulting industry exceeded 40% for the second year in a row. (The official Harvard Institutional Research survey included students who were not employed, so the percentages for these fields were lower than in the Crimson survey.)
