Boring but lucrative major vs Interesting poor major

College Majors
1

<p>I am having a crisis which I’m sure is a very popular one. I don’t know what to major in, so I ask my parents for help, and they tell me major in economics or finance, go on to grad school, and eventually get a lucrative career in investment banking, business management, etc. </p>

<p>This is a very pragmatic approach. And a very luring one, considering such careers are in fact the most lucrative careers in the world; for instance, according to the Princeton Review, with 10 yrs of experience, the median investment banker makes $1,000,000. </p>

<p>But I also know that during the first few years, you have to work your but off 90+ hours a week, and even when things get good, it is rare to find a work week of less than 70 hours. </p>

<p>Plus, I don’t have any interest in a career such as investment banking. And I now know, after talking to many of such a profession, that most who ended up with such a career had no desire for the career except for the big paycheck. </p>

<p>So the ultimate question: is it worth majoring in a field that you feel is boring just for the grand paycheck? I know what the “moral” and theoretical answer is, but let us blend pragmatism into it.</p>

<p>P.S. My real interests are in psychology, philosophy, neurology, sociology, and even physics, my I don’t have any distinguishable love for any one field. For instance, sometimes I like physics, sometimes I hate it. I really, really love philosophy, but that’s the major my parent’s really don’t want me entering into since philosophers really don’t make any dough at all.</p>

2

<p>Why not major in philosophy and then go to law school?</p>

3

<p>You have to choose a field that offers you the best incentives. How much does having a big pay check mean to you? Keep in mind money is only one measuring stick of the desirability of a job. There is a significant cost working in working at a job you hate, albeit not a monetary one.</p>

4

<p>GR Elton,
I have thought about that, and I have heard that philosophy majors tend to score very well on the LSAT. But let’s think about it this way. You can go through the same amount of education in economics, probably even less, by getting only an MBA, though a PhD would definitely secure things faster, and you can land a job in, let us say investment banking. According to PR, with 10 yrs experience, the median investment banker’s income is $1,000,000, while the same for a corporate lawyer is $150,000, and for a “trial lawyer” is $127,000. I got all three statistics from the same website, so we can assume that the percentage of error on all three stats is about the same. Now, there is a big difference between $1,000,000 and $150,000, nonetheless $127,000. You can have a good standard of living on $150K, but the highest, supreme standard of living at $1,000K. That’s the extreme in comparison with the mild.</p>

<p>Rob54,
I understand where you’re going with this marginal analysis. But the problem is, I don’t know how much certain variables in this analysis mean to me. The problem for me is more philosophical than just plain economical. </p>

<p>What I’m basically saying is that I am trapped. I don’t know where to progress without even knowing the basics. People often say go with your instincts, and I often ask them, what instincts?! </p>

<p>What I’m really asking for is sort of like an open discussion, or even a debate on this matter, because I know for a fact that more people are going through the same problem, and if they’re not going through it now, there is a possibility they might go through it in the future, so why not start tackling this right now. I want people who know what they want, or think they know what they might want, to be kind enough to tell me their patterns of thought, and why they believe the way they believe. I really need inspiration, and inspiration in the form of arguments, not just advice.</p>

5

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<p>Those statistics are both entirely inaccurate and entirely out of context. A first year associate at a major law firm (four years out of college) will make at least $160,000 by the time you graduate, with the money earned increasing markedly every year, especially (if) after you make partner. A partner at a good firm will be making at least a mid-six figure salary.</p>

<p>More importantly, however, your chances of becoming partner at a law firm are far higher than a managing director at an investment bank earning $1 million. If you go into investment banking you will be competing against the very best and brightest young adults in America, and most of those who enter as analysts will not be promoted to vice president (let alone managing director, where $1 million salaries are possible).</p>

<p>In fact, unless you go to a top tier school, you are very unlikely to be hired as an analyst in the first place.</p>

<p>So yes, investment bankers earn more than lawyers. But in order to succeed in investment banking you’ll have to outcompete some of the smartest and most competitive people in the country – many of whom are very interested in markets and finance.</p>

<p>If you think you can do that, and you go to a top tier school (i.e. Ivy League caliber), then in fact what you major in doesn’t matter. Personally, I’m a philosophy major, and I plan on going into trading and hedge funds. At that level of school, it doesn’t matter what you major in provided you are (a) highly intelligent and (b) have some requisite coursework in finance. So, in fact, if you’re capable of advancing to managing director of an investment bank, you can probably have your cake and eat it too.</p>

6

<p>Yes, but at the same time, to become a top lawyer with an average salary of $160,000 takes a lot of competing against the “smartest and most competitive people in the country” as well, with far more people who are actually interested in law than the parallel fitting of those in investment banking. In other words, less people go into law for the money than into investment banking. I went on Forbes list of highest pay companies, and the law firms on the list payed an average starting salary of no more than $170,000. If they were good enough to be on the top 10 of a Forbes list, you better believe they hire the most brilliant and passionate lawyers.</p>

<p>Secondly, with you being very well informed in business and all, you should know that I have not even been discussing the bonuses that investment bankers make. The bonuses alone outweigh the actual salaries of the investment bankers in many instances. That is a very simple and basic fact. If this is taken into account, the salary difference for the two is heightened even furthur. </p>

<p>Third, while the passions at the very extremes may exist for both, the overall level of passion for law amongst lawyers you should agree is more than that for investment bankers. Just the other day my cousin, a recent MIT grad, told me that about 30% of those who majored in engineering went on to business, and with most of these persons striving for the hot spots for investment banking. Even he was lured, but once he got to his seventh interview by Goldman Sachs, he gave up.</p>

<p>And for the sake of progressing this argument, can we assume that we are dealing with a scenario where the person at crisis is a very smart student, who if not accepted to an Ivy League school, will definitely go to an ivy-leage caliber school. Also, let us assume that should he/she decide to go with the investment banking scheme, he/she will decide to major in economics or finance throughout undergrad, and even go to grad school to get an MBA, and even a PhD, if necessary, to outcompete the other competitive students. So basically, let us assume that the student definitely can attain the job, with lots of hard work.</p>

<p>Now knowing those assumptions, let’s go to the original question, “is it worth majoring in a field that you feel is boring just for the grand paycheck?”</p>

7

<p>

Then your post is useless because you do not know what you want. And if you knew what you wanted, you wouldn’t be making this post. You need to delve deeper into the fields you’re interested in, but asking someone to answer an age-old question for you is an act of irresponsibility. You have to try and determine a proper value for each variable in this equation, and then put it together on your own. If you look to someone else for an answer you’re going to get the wrong one.</p>

<p>And if there’s one thing I can say in contrast to GR Elton’s post: (1) the law field is far more overpopulated than finance (which is saying something), (2) “partner” at a law firm doesn’t mean anything unless it’s partner at a good law firm, which will take you a significant chunk of your life to get, (3) a first year associate at a major law firm making “at least $160,000” will be working more hours (yes, it’s possible) than any investment banker, will generally be treated like **** because they’re expendable and might not even be looking at advancement without playing a tremendous amount of office politics.</p>

<p>Arguably the single most unattractive field and unattractive job market for prospective graduates in any industry is law, with the explicit exception of IP and tax. If you cannot go to a top 10 law school you won’t get a job in the top firms, which is something you can say about no other field, and if you go to anything other than a top 10 school without getting significant scholarship money/having a rich family you’ll be paying off debt for 25 years. Do not go into law for money. Do not. Do not. You can make money there, but if you think that’s the path to riches then you’re not going to make money anywhere, because while there are plenty money-hungry lawyers, there are about a billion other industries where your chances of serious wealth creation are better.</p>

8

<p>“Then your post is useless because you do not know what you want”–tetrishead</p>

<p>I don’t think it is entirely useless. I mean I do agree it does show that I am immature, and I have no problem in admitting that. I am in fact very immature in that I don’t know what I exactly want. But when trying to learn what I want, I need ideas, I need to conversate with people. I have already discussed these matters from my parents and they have very clearly stated that they want me to go into economics and make the big $$$$. I’m grateful to them for being so open, but at the same time I have been left very confused. I am a smart guy, but I don’t have any strong specific interests, and so I wonder, why not just do what my pragmatic parents want me to do?</p>

<p>Now, before I go along naively making decisions, I need some more fresh new ideas on the matter, which is why I made this post. I think overall I am immature, but I feel my posting here shows some level of responsibility in that I am seeking various ideas on the conflict that I am trying to resolve in a limited amount of time. It would be irresponsible of me to accept the first idea as my final decision, but of course that is not what I plan on doing at all.</p>

9

<p>Well, first off, investment banking as the idea people have is kind of a catch all for people who know nothing about the financial industry, heard the term on CNBC and think working for Goldman Sachs is like working on a cloud in heaven surrounded by super models, champagne and caviar. I’d personally rather hang myself from a ceiling fan than work in investment banking, and there are pathways into PE, HF, and PWM work that do not go through IB. The only people that stay in front-office IB are people that get fat and happy or people that are on a path for an MD or a bs executive position. So the idea of “hey, investment banking woo!, that’ll be a lot of money” is kind of flawed in that IB is an optimal first job–not an optimal job.</p>

<p>The problem with trying to decide what it is you want to do when you have absolutely no idea what you really aspire to, and you aren’t willing to dig further and figure out what interests are skin deep and what go farther down, is that you’re going to end up making the wrong decision no matter what–and more importantly, you’re almost guaranteed to not end up in the position you think you will. We put college on a pedestal, we stress about it, we fuss about our major, we hyperventilate about a B- instead of an A–and all of it, K-12, college, struggling on tests, getting caught in the middle of a rain storm trying to avoid being any later to class than you already are–it is completely irrelevant the second you reach the second year of your first job. The first 20-25 years of your life, in a professional setting, mean absolutely nothing by the time you’re 27. And even trying to get that IB job, yeah, a math, econ or finance major is going to have a leg up on a history major–but if the history major has demostrated quant skills, is a little better talker, and is a little lucky he’ll get the job.</p>

<p>If you have no serious superceding responsibilities, and by that I mean you have children or someone you are financially responsible for, then your primary responsibility is to yourself. And that responsibility entails finding out what you enjoy, and doing it. There are other factors, and anyone with a smidgen of common sense will recognize what they are, but you have in front of you a high qualtiy education (presumably) in a multitude of fields and you are free to pick whatever you want, knowing that most employers pay for MBAs and post graduate degeres, and yet you’re tying your bachelor degree to your entire future as if it’ll define you forever, as if it’s some tattoo on your forehead that can’t be lasered off.</p>

<p>You are trying to make about the now by making a decision about the future, a future you cannot see, a future where you don’t know what you want to do, and the great irony is that what you do now probably won’t matter.</p>

<p>Here’s my recommendation, in an easily digestible step-by-step format:</p>

<p>Step one: Take a xanax.
Step two: Take introductory courses in a multitude of fields that sound interesting.
Step three: Join a club for a reason other than it fitting on your resume.
Step four: After following steps 1-3, come back when you are near the major declaration deadline.</p>

10

<p>I really appreciate the detailed perspective and advice. I guess maybe I am stressing too much, but I hear all my fellow students and friends talking about their majors and such that I can’t help but get nervous when I’m the only one left out of the loop of focus. </p>

<p>I’ll try to follow your step by step recommendation, but I might have to skip the xanax part–I don’t have any.</p>

11

<p>Your fellow students and friends are as immature as you are, and your parents, with all due respect, are not authorities on the subjet of modeling wage performance normalized for inherently intangible personal characterisitics and years worked for specific undergraduate majors in a multitude of fields aggregated to provide a data set to be drawn from and interpreted.</p>

<p>As for the philosophers not making any dough thing, that’s true, philosophers are academics. Philosophers with high quality internships who enter into management consulting out of school because they did better when a theoretical case was thrown at them in a weed-out interview make dough, though. A finance major makes it easier for you to get a better job out of school in the same way graduating from Princeton instead of Cal State Fullerton makes it easier for you to get a better job out of school. There are too many intangibles to this that people try to quantify. The only things that are certain in life are death and taxes.</p>

<p>This is not the same as college admissions (which for plenty of schools are pretty hard to quantify anyway), and it’s not uniform, and even if you are a year or two behind other kids once you’re a few years into your career all that matters is on the job performance–and then you’ve got a whole other set of intangible experiences to deal with, that people think they can quantify but can’t, and you’ll be asking questions similar to this all over again.</p>

<p>The xanax can be replaced with a few beers.</p>

12

<p>tetrishead…you make too much sense to be on these forums. Just curious. What is your occupation?</p>

13

<p>Incoming college freshman is technically my occupation, which would be why I’m on these forums, since I left my job working for a real estate management group in preparation for starting school in August. I just happen to be 2-4 years older than most incoming freshman as a result of working and taking care of some family members after getting my diploma (although I technically started working full time when I was around 14), and almost all my friends are 2-3 years out of college and working in some professional capacity that is either finance or technology related. That combined with spending years trading and conversing on various forums that are somewhat private and for specific professions are the reason I have any knowledge at all.</p>

14

<p>I’m not worthy. /bows</p>

15

<p>I am 49 Years old, energy professional… and I agree with most of what tetrishead has to say, so I second the too smart for these boards ideas</p>

16

<p>nice…I wish you well for college and thereafter.</p>

17

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<p>Why would he be too smart for these boards? What are you implying about these boards? Are you too smart for these boards?</p>

18

<p>$1,000,000/year is useless if you can’t get away from work to enjoy it.</p>

19

<p>How could investment banking be thought of as boring?</p>

20

<p>My dad swears to me that the key to life is to enjoy what you do. He said that he has seen so many rich people who seem to become more dissatisfied the richer they get. If you can figure out some way to have a job that you can’t wait to get to in the morning and have such a ball doing that time just flies by, then you have attained true career success.</p>

<p>Now, the fact that I already know this secret doesn’t solve everything (for me at least), because I still need to figure out what kind of job I would love to do the most. I hope you find this out for yourself. I wish you luck.</p>