Is Wharton Undergrad recruiting as competitive as working at a megafund?

Read a post about how difficult and demanding it is to study at Wharton undergrad these days due to the hyper competitive nature of recruiting and the overall environment.
 

https://www.wallstreetoasis.com/forum/investment-…

Sounds like the school has many of the brightest kids applying for the same jobs, yet only 10-20% of them get into IB. Can’t imagine how difficult it would be to stand out as the top 20% at a place as intense and driven as Penn... Wondering if that somewhat resembles the competitiveness of working at a MF PE, where a class consists of the top kids from ib, yet only maybe 10-20% get promoted and the rest of the class despite being likely great at their jobs, have to go elsewhere for work or go back to school (where they attend Wharton again)? 

16 Comments
 

Lol the mega funds probably have penn grads comprise of half their class 

 
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Would imagine MF is even more intense than Wharton. There are 2 additional funnels where talent is sourced from. From Wharton or any decent school, 10-20% of students go to IB, where then 10% of those people go to megafund, many of which are Wharton kids, then you have to be top 10-20% of that group to become vp

 

PE is full of wharton grads and similar types from other places. It's the same types of overachieving personalities you'll see in both ib and pe

 
Funniest

No, going to Wharton is harder than any finance job. In fact it is more similar to being a Navy Seal. Congrats champ, you really made it

 

At least 60% of Wharton grads would break into IB/PE maybe even 70-75% of those who actually try so unsure where you got the 10-20% from

 

A lot of people from elite schools try to go higher than consulting/IB. Consulting/IB is seen as a good thing but not remotely as a super hard thing if you actually wanted to go there. Many will pass on opportunities it's part of the reason why many elite MBA programs slid in rankings due to newer MBA rankings putting a bigger emphasis on jobs.

 

I read posts like this then realize that half the people who are “Analyst 2 in IB-M&A” are actually college freshmen.

 

The point of the post makes sense. People who go to the absolute most competitive schools or jobs may find that even if they're in the top third, they may not see as optimal results compared to if they went to a less competitive yet still strong schools or firms

 

That's just the nature of top schools. Not everyone will land their dream jobs and it will suck more because of how hard you've hard to work to get into that school

 

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