<p>Sachs and Summers are both economists, and of course a professional degree (an MD or JD) is a dramatically different example. Sach’s career in particular seems to have been exceptional, as he was apparently invited to join the Society of Fellows as an undergraduate.</p>
<p>I suspect much of the discussion here has been orienting around soon-to-be English or History PhD’s.</p>
<hr>
<p>In a hyper-competitive market, branding matters much more.</p>
<p>For one thing, you get the chance to tap into two alumni networks if you attend two schools.</p>
<p>More importantly, it opens up more doors for socializing. I did my undergraduate work at Duke (true), and went somewhere else for medical school. We’ll pretend it’s Princeton (it’s not). As an undergraduate, I still get to talk about the moving bookshelves in the bottom of the law school library if I ever meet a law student, or the ATMs in the hospital if I ever meet a medical student from Duke. And, of course, there’s always Duke basketball. As a Princeton medical student, I can still talk about the best places to eat near campus if I ever run into an undergrad alum. These sorts of conversations help with interviews, talking to your boss about his kids, etc.</p>
<p>I don’t know how important they are in the academic world, but in many fields they can help quite a bit. My father just hired a new partner for his group, and I suspect part of what made this interview memorable was that this young physician did medical school at my school, “Princeton”. (“Best school in the world!”, my father tells him with a grin. Was it any surprise that he got the job?) He went to school at the same place as his prospective boss’s son – and he could have doubled his odds of doing so had he gone to different places to get his bachelor’s vs. his MD.</p>
<p>Third, diversity helps people isolate whichever brand is their favorite. Again, I can tell people that I went to Duke and (in my fake story) Princeton, and Southerners feel like I’m from the South while people from Jersey tend to feel that I’m from Jersey. </p>
<p>Fourth, diversity is simply helpful branding-wise on its own. I can’t explain this one in psychoeconomic terms, but it’s just *cooler *to go to Duke and the Princeton than it is to tell people I went to Duke for all eight years.</p>