I mean, if you had the opportunity to earn six figures at graduation, wouldn't you go into these fields too?
75% of Yalies are normal people (the other 25% come from money). They're the children of working professionals, federal government employees, etc. They have had comfortable upbringings, but their families don't have "fuck you" money.
They've been pushed and prodded all their life by parents who, like everyone else without "fuck you" money, are desperately afraid of falling out of the middle class. Most of the kids don't know it yet, and maybe the parents don't consciously acknowledge it, but it's a major force underlying the thinking of every parent who sends his kid to an SAT prep class so he can get a high score and go to Yale.
At the same time, regular jobs suck. Thanks to the consultants, they're overly structured, have shitty benefits, and workers are managed by PHB's who don't know jack-shit about the jobs that the workers do. Upward mobility is curtailed, because many F500's prefer to hire managers from the ranks of consultants, instead of promoting people from within. The risk in potentially more interesting jobs is high: fail to make it big, and you could be stuck in a job where you get yelled at for punching in a couple of minutes late and to the extent that you're lucky enough to get health insurance, it'll be on a shitty plan. Thankfully science/tech is mercifully insulated from this phenomenon (so far), but many students don't have the particular aptitude or desire for those fields.
I imagine the question isn't, "Why are they going into this lucrative industry?" as much as it is, "why is this industry so exceptionally lucrative?" To me, the financial industry looks like every other bubble right before the pop with everyone trying to pile in to the money machine, but any close examination of the machine reveals an empty ruse.
Maybe you're right and they were pushed into it. But it's short-term thinking and I am not going to cry when the bubble pops and leaves them holding a big sack of dead end.
"To me, the financial industry looks like every other bubble right before the pop with everyone trying to pile in to the money machine, but any close examination of the machine reveals an empty ruse."
And I don't think I've ever heard a kind word about management consultants. A field dominated by 20 somethings with 0 professional work experience brought in to tell executives and managers of highly successful multi-million/billion dollar companies how to run their businesses...
A question each and every person that hires a management consultant should ask themselves, "would I hire this 20 something to run my organization?" If the answer is no, then why are you paying them to tell you how to run it?
It's a bit like bringing in a random, just out of school, development consultant and giving them charge over major development teams. Oh wait, I've seen that happen too, each project then proceeded to go several times over budget and were delivered broken and late and eventually scrapped.
"why is this industry so exceptionally lucrative?"
The honest to god real reason these guys are hired, and how the system ultimately works, is for a couple of really quite bad reasons
a) The CEO ends up in a bind with no good ideas, or knows that no matter what happens, they're screwed. It could be lack of product, or a better competitor, etc.
b) The CEO doesn't want to appear weak so that people will still follow him/her while the ship sinks.
So they bring in management consultants, sold as "experts". Having a bunch of Ivy Leaguers helps with that image. The entire problem, including the blame for when it inevitably fails, is intended to go onto the Consultants. Their job is to appear busy and smart, then take the blame (and the large consultancy fee) when it all falls apart. This leaves the CEO in a good position "I brought in experts and even they couldn't make it work!".
And that's it.
That's the entire management consultancy industry in a nutshell. Blame for pay.
A great article on the phenomenon that describes a life I've had confirmed by several friends in the field who've all since gotten out: http://tech.mit.edu/V130/N18/dubai.html
(they were all also shocked at how hard it is to actually run a company vs. what their years in management consultancy led them to believe)
I think there's another reason related to your a) and b) why companies hire management consultants, particularly in less dire corporate situations than you describe above. I think a lot of management consultants' work comes from boards or division managers who have a difficult decision they know they want to make (fire workers, spin off less successful business units), but need an "impartial" "expert" to agree with them to help justify it. The company asks only the questions they want the consulting company to consider, they get the answers they want, and they have an "independent" (and expensive) second opinion that covers them so they can go ahead with what they knew they would do in the first place.
That is 1 reason - another reason is because competitor XYZ might have hired them a few years ago and they can get some inside info. They might say they don't share anything, but if Person A worked for a past company and he now is consulting for you - don't you think he'll spill some secrets...
Consulting and finance are lucrative, partially because there are serious demands of the job that you're not considering.
* Working 7 days a week (in the office for 110 hours)
* Living out of a suitcase
* Often living out of a suitcase in the middle of nowhere
* Virtually no vacation
* Expectation that you'll forfeit a vacation if the firm needs you
* A lot of stress
And that's just the start of it. Plenty of people burn out and decide that the paycheck isn't worth it. Imagine that. You're making the mistake of only looking at the glamorous part of the job (the pay check) instead of actually taking a look at what the job entails.
The difficulty or inconvenience of a job does not really imply additional remuneration. If it did, migrant farmworkers would probably be the richest people in the world.
The difficulty does not, but pay is only one form of compensation. Those with the most opportunity have many good options, some with more pay, and some with better work conditions. in other words, if you need a smart person you need to compel them to work for you.
Yes, but now you're making the skeptic's point: management consulting works by using the shock-and-awe of lots of Ivy League degrees to provide cover for management. In other words, a complete waste of shareholder money and employee time.
75% of Yalies are normal people (the other 25% come from money). They're the children of working professionals, federal government employees, etc. They have had comfortable upbringings, but their families don't have "fuck you" money.
They've been pushed and prodded all their life by parents who, like everyone else without "fuck you" money, are desperately afraid of falling out of the middle class. Most of the kids don't know it yet, and maybe the parents don't consciously acknowledge it, but it's a major force underlying the thinking of every parent who sends his kid to an SAT prep class so he can get a high score and go to Yale.
At the same time, regular jobs suck. Thanks to the consultants, they're overly structured, have shitty benefits, and workers are managed by PHB's who don't know jack-shit about the jobs that the workers do. Upward mobility is curtailed, because many F500's prefer to hire managers from the ranks of consultants, instead of promoting people from within. The risk in potentially more interesting jobs is high: fail to make it big, and you could be stuck in a job where you get yelled at for punching in a couple of minutes late and to the extent that you're lucky enough to get health insurance, it'll be on a shitty plan. Thankfully science/tech is mercifully insulated from this phenomenon (so far), but many students don't have the particular aptitude or desire for those fields.