I am a Black woman that graduated from Penn. Upon graduation, I followed my dreams and went into independent filmmaking and writing. Now at the age of 37, I want to get into Finance as either a broker or investment banker. I understand the economy is dire, but what are my chances of even being considered – especially concerning the age and the economy?

What would be the most time efficient way of getting in the door?

I went the route of private undergrad and public grad school.

The goods about the private undergrad: 1) Free tuition scholarship, after 2nd year I received free room and board for working in the residence halls; 2) small class size and strong Chemistry dept

The cons about the private undergrad: 1) not well known 2) limited recruitment opportunities and not in metropolitan area

The goods about the public grad school: 1) School of Pharmacy was strong and had established name; 2) Free tuition and living stipend; 3) located close to metropolitan area with low cost of living

The cons about the public grad school: None really except that I got a little too comfortable where I was and stayed for 6 years (Masters and PhD).

I was hired after graduation into the Biotech/Pharma field w/ a starting pay of ~$80K w/ 15% bonus (’05), which is pretty good because w/o the right degree and referrals, PhDs often have to do several years of Post Doc.

As of 2008, the entry level pay for Bachelors is $49-60, Masters is $60-79, PhD is $76-98, MD is $123-160 (K per year). With the recession, these rates might stagnate and bonuses might be non-existent.

Certainly not all private schools are well known and not all public schools offer a lower quality or prestige. Having the right referrals for the area you want to be in, whether it be the school or the prof’s name, will open doors, but you still need to have the goods and have paid your dues. I certainly see the difference when I flash my undergraduate degree vs. my graduate degree.

If I could do it over again would I do it the same way? Probably because I had some really good times, but I will say that I feel like I have paid the price in time (being in university for 10 years).

My current employer and many others offer excellent educational assistance benefits. Here’s another example of an educational/career route using those benefits:
-private university in computer science, student worker in IT dept
-switched to full time position at IT dept, abandoned degree
-a number of years later, used dept benefits and enrolled as part time student while working full time
-BS received 6 years later, went on to received 2 other Masters (while still working full time)
Pros of the above route: 1) significant savings in education cost; 2) entered work force much earlier than most, accumulated savings/retirement/benefits higher
Cons about the above route: 1) going back to school after a number of years is not easy; 2) juggling full time work and part time school is not easy

An observation given to me by a fellow grad student: get higher degrees in increasingly more prestigious places. If you skip the order, BS from Stanford and PhD from KU, people will ask why, even if the answer is obvious or personal.

A look at the Michelle’s and Barack’s academic pedigrees will tell you that there are many routes to success. One size often does not fit all, and mistakes might turn out to be serendipitous.

Got any pointers for that?

The bad side– Not all jobs start students at $65. I have a liberal arts degree. I will most likely be starting somewhere between $30000 and $40000. I’m hoping to be closer to the other end.

I worked through college– usually taking 4 courses at a time. I was fairly active in the student body.. and I’m working full time now while taking my last two courses. I’m older than your average college student. I’m 24. I want to move out of my parents house– but when looking at my salary … and the increasing cost of housing, I don’t know that I’ll ever be able to do anything other than rent without the help of my parents. My parents are not willing to help me out– and yes. I find this stressful.

Everyone isn’t coming from your background. Keep this in mind before stating that college is cheap.

College is expensive. Worth the expense… but moving forward in life is just as delayed with college as it is without it. Instead of gaining work experience, I now have a degree to “make more” .. but the “more” is really going into my debt expenses.

— As for private schools— I love my private education. I started in a public school– and it was way too large. I was overwhelmed even though I was from a large city. I didn’t share the same obsession with drinking and partying as my classmates and I hated not knowing much about my professor and needing the say something amazing in order to get a moment alone with my instructor during office hours. Private schools have small classes. I’ve learned more. I think that makes me more prepared for the work world.

But in reality– that difference depends on your employer. I’m happy I paid to learn as opposed to paying for a paper that merely implies I did.

So in my case, college was expensive because I didn’t need it and would have done better with out it. Seven and a half years out of school and still regretting that I went to college.

For example, anything outside of the desert areas of California, any safe area of D.C., Seattle, and Boston will have much higher cost of living expenses than the national average for urban areas.

NYC is certainly expensive if you rent an apartment in Manhattan, probably 2-3x national average for urban areas.

However, if you live in any of the other boroughs of NYC, the cost of living is maybe 1.5x the national average for urban areas.

While it’s true that not all investment banks are “in” NYC, some boutiques are headed in Silicon Valley, others in VA/Chicago/Atlanta, all the bulge bracket firms are in NYC (that is, the major players). When I say “in” I mean have their head offices there. All the bulge-bracket firms also have smaller offices elsewhere in the country, but the main offices where those exorbitant salaries are paid and where all the managing directors work are in NYC.

I agree on Mackie’s advice on reading Monkey Business. It’s an amusing and insightful read. I had my girlfriend read it last month and it absolutely changed her mind about going into i-banking.

After I got my acceptance letters, my father and I walked into the financial aid offices with copies of our tax returns, projected budgets, and the aid packages offered by other schools. We got the best offer expanded, and asked the others to match. It worked, and I went to my top choice (a selective private university) for less than I would have paid at my in-state ‘safety’.

It’s manageable. Or, at least it was when I was in school (I graduated in ’00). I can’t imagine things have changed all that much since then.

Never heard of it? Go find the US News rankings for the past few years (http://www.usnews.com/usnews/e....._brief.php). Williams is the #1 Liberal Arts College. (sorry they don’t teach hyperlinking). (Coincidentally Williams has also been recognized as the best Division III athletic school 10 out of the past 11 years too).

All of the major investment banks and consulting firms recruit on campus. A sample of where some close friends will be working:
Goldman Sachs
Morgan Stanley
JP Morgan (x2)
Bain & Co. (x3)
McKinsey & Co.

My $160k+ in tuition? Worth every penny.

Interestingly enough, UNC Chapel Hill has 100% of need met by aid (need-based assistance) -I think that is so impressive.

I’d still be careful. Financial “aid” isn’t what it used to be. Too often these days, “aid” simply means taking out bigger federal loans (15% of cost: student’s Staffords & Perkins + 85% of cost: parent’s PLUS = 100% of “aid” met). It’s possible for schools to meet 100% of your costs with “aid” and for you not to get one Pell Grant or scholarship.

But that 65K doesn’t include the 40K annual bonuses, the 10K signing bonus, and the 401K plus benefits. Not to mention, after your first year, your salary goes up 10-15K and your bonuses increase likewise. This continues year after year.

Investment banks are notorious for paying out over 50% of their billion-dollar revenues to employee salaries. One bulge bracket firm, Lazard, has it as a company guideline to payout at least 57.5% of revenues each year.

And not all investment banks are in high-cost cities. There’s plenty in Chicago and Atlanta, which are much cheaper to live in than New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Seattle. When I moved to Atlanta, I realized that the cost of living out here was 18% less than Los Angeles and 26% less than in new York. The housing prices are much cheaper out here too.

link

Not in investment banking….”

Yea, but what do you think this 65K average is composed of? 65K starting salary sounds good on paper, but you’ll be living in NYC or another expensive metro area and your 65K has the buying power of 40K.

Because IB jobs are so concentrated in very expensive cities, the starting salary average for this field is very skewed and misleading.

Person A – Went to Virginia Tech (Public VA Univ) from 01-05 for approx $21,800 (2,725/semester) in tutition and graduated with a bachelor’s degree in accounting. Currently working at a local public accounting firm making $xx,000.

Person B – Went to University of Richmond (Private VA Univ) from 01-05 for approx $116,800 (14,600/semster). Currently working at a Big Four public accounting firm (same city as Person A) making $xx,500.

You read that correctly. Both were able to find the exact same position in the exact same industry with only a $500 difference in yearly income between the public and private degree.

Which Person do you think is the one reading Jonathon’s blog?

“just a quick point about part-time earnings – If you are claimed as a dependant (i.e. by your parents), you do not need to pay taxes on earned income lower than $5,000, so you may want to plan ahead. earning slightly more will net you less.”

Does this mean that over $5,000 you have to pay taxes on the entire amount, or just the amount over $5,000?

$ is certainly attractive if it doesn’t come from a 100 hours/week work schedule.

Two to three years of hardwork in the upstart means paying off all your student loans and other debt, easily getting into a top business school, and having the business cards of company CEOs in your pocket.

And the “100 hours/week” is only during rough times at some firms. The typical work week for analysts is between 60-80 hours with an occasional 12-hour shift.

But, that’s for entry-level analysts. Associated have better hours and usually put in 45-50 a week. Even higher-ups (e.g., Managing Directors, Vice Presidents) pretty muh get to choose their schedules.

Look at it this way, if you tough in the beginning and are able to put in as little as ten years, you’ll be working about 20 hours week and making about $1M a year.

Now, I’ll warn most people. This is not a good occupation if you plan on getting married and having kids during your mid-twenties. This is a career for flexible single people, people who have no kids and an understanding spouse or people who date within the industry.

You have to have good organizing skills, be able to accept last-time assignments with swift deadlines, and have a Type-A personality.

You’re going to eat whether or not you’re enrolled in college. You’re going to need a place to live whether or not you’re in college. And dating costs money regardless of whether you’re in school or not.

These really shouldn’t be considered ‘college expenditures’ any more than one’s medical bills or utilities.

oh yeah…that was my freshman year.

Actually Eugene,

You forgot the top 2 “black Ivies”, Morehouse College (Martin Luther King’s alma mater, called the “black Harvard”) and Spelman College (Morehouse’s sister school). These two top-ranking historically black colleges (HBCU’s) are where the firms hand-pick most of their minority recruits from the cream of the applicant pool. The Wall Street Journal in 2004 reported that Morehouse outranked both Berkely and Emory University in MBA/law top school admissions.

Golman Sachs and Lehman Brothers have special on-campus recruiting programs for both Morehouse and Spelman.

But, you’re right for the most part. You pretty much have to either go to an Ivy league or top school. I happen to go to one of the schools mentioned sometime on this board, but I’ll let you figure that one out.

That’s referencing undergraduates. Most analysts are undergraduates. Rarely do MBA’s serve as analysts.

Most MBA’s are seeking associate positions that pay starting salaries in the range of $100K-230K+.

This big pay-off is why the MBA degree became so highly coveted in the corporate world. There was once a time when just your Average Joe could be working a 35K sales job somewhere, he then decides to go to an average-okay business school, and later comes out making $100K easy at some big investment banking firm on Wall Street. An MBA used to mean something big. It used to mean automatic pay raises and big-sounding job titles.

But, it’s not that easy anymore. Now just about everyone has an MBA. You can get them in as little as 6 months to a year while attending part-time and taking classes online in your basement while in your underwear. Put it to you this way… Even my neighbor’s dog pretty much has an MBA. I’m almost willing to put money on it.

Not all MBA’s are the same. A Harvard MBA will get you a job at Goldman Sachs easily but a part-time Univeristy of Phoenix “executive” Online MBA even won’t get you touched. You might get hired elsewhere, but not in investment banking. Not a chance.

Partners in investment banking top firms in the industry usually make $700K-20M+. Some partmers can even make upwards of $100M, but they are quite rare and usually are board members of many other corporations than which they are partner. The controversially “over-compensated” Chairman of the New York Stock Exchange Nick Grasso made $250M+ annually before he was forced to give up his seat on the board. (People were getting tired of seeing layoffs post 9-11 while he was making that kind of salary.) What most people didn’t know was that this was just ONE of his salaries. He also served on serveral other boards at the same time (some of them investment banks) and makes rather comparable salaries.

But anyway, yeah that’s the numbers for undergrads. Undergrads in investment banking make starting out what typical MBAs make in other fields. This is why careers in investment banking are highly sought for and coveted and ultra-competitive to get into. Having “Goldman Sachs Investment Banking Analyst” on your resume is literally a just about guarantee for a job anywhere in the Corporate America. In fact, the paid bonuses at firms like Goldman and Lehman are actually slightly lower (in the thousands) than the industry average because these firms know precisely what it means for you to put them on your resume and know that you’ll be willing to give up some change for the priviledge (which still is worth it, nonetheless).

Put it to you this way, rich people like Donald Trump have their daughters working at investment banks like Merril Lynch (Ivanka Trump actually works there in their New York headquaters). The Clintons have their daughter Chelsea working at McKinsey & Co. at an entry-level consultant. If you look at where alumni from the top firms go, they’re speckled throughout top government positions, the broadcast media and are CEOs and board members of America’s corporations.

Harvard is the straight ticket to the upper-middle class. Investment banking is the straight ticket to the lower-upper class.

For more on investment banking, visit:
1.) WetFeet Career Guide: Investment Banking
2.) Salaries in Investment Banking (with bonus)

and read these great books….

1.) Monkey Business : Swinging Through the Wall Street Jungle (a very brutally honest take)

2.) The Fast Track (one Goldman alumni’s take how to get in and stay)

There’s not much written on investment banking, and there’s a good reason why. The people competing for these positions don’t want to reveal their secrets. It’s a very cut-throat industry.

Other highly obscure, high-paying and highly competitive occupations are: venture capitalist, corporate lawyer, estate planning attorney, contracted city planner.

You can also take your chances at floor trading, but just know that just about everyone and their mom wants to be a registered stockbroker but not everyone can handle the stress of living off of commissions and having to beg people to buy stocks (even in bad market conditions).