finance opportunities: NYC vs. Chicago

jhoratio

jjc1122aside from prop trading, it's easily NYC. more jobs and better networking available. hate to sound elitist, but the brightest ivy league kids do tend to move to NYC while Chicago mainly gets the big 10 alumni.

NYC does get the ivies, true, but you are assuming that all the best and brightest from every area of the country go to ivy league schools. Let me be the one to burst your bubble: they don't. And while ivies are certainly among the most competitive schools, the fact is that the top 100 students at University of Illinois are almost certainly as smart and talented as the top 100 Columbia or Dartmouth or Yale. People attend ivies because they're smart, but also because they have rich parents. Don't discount the latter characteristic as a primary driver of the student population at these schools. And its just different out east. If you're a top student with rich parents in NY or MA, where are you going to go, Binghamton? UMASS? Rutgers? Obviously not because those schools kinda suck, with apologies to any WSO alumni.

Not the case in the Midwest or west Coast where you have loads of public and private options, including the relatively cheap in state option. Unlike the shit public universities out east (UVA excepted), the Big 10 schools are by and large very very good schools. For kids in Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Indiana, Califonia, etc. the college picture is quite different. So when a firm in Chicago "gets the big 10 alumni" its not like it was with a tear in their eye. The fucking MD is probably from a Big 10 school. And he's making just as much cash as any of the MDs anywhere else in the firm.

Full disclosure: I went to an Ivy league school

I agree that the midwest has better state schools than the northeast. I disagree though on your assertion that the top students at a big 10 school are on the same level as the top students at ivies. There's a reason why top financial firms and top graduate programs recruit so heavily from the ivies, especially harvard, princeton, wharton, yale.

Regarding money, it's true that there's a fair share of rich kids at these schools, but most students get financial aid. The ivies have gotten very serious about getting talented students from middle and working class backgrounds. Harvard and Princeton for instance give out need-based grants to students whose parents cannot afford the price tag.

Look, I'm not bashing the big ten; michigan and northwestern are great schools and illinois has a solid engineering program. But with regards to finance, NYC still gets the cream of the crop. This is just anecdotal, but the only chicago firms that top ivy kids would take over NYC are citadel, getco, and the chicago office of elite consulting firms like mckinsey.

jhoratio

jjc1122aside from prop trading, it's easily NYC. more jobs and better networking available. hate to sound elitist, but the brightest ivy league kids do tend to move to NYC while Chicago mainly gets the big 10 alumni.

NYC does get the ivies, true, but you are assuming that all the best and brightest from every area of the country go to ivy league schools. Let me be the one to burst your bubble: they don't. And while ivies are certainly among the most competitive schools, the fact is that the top 100 students at University of Illinois are almost certainly as smart and talented as the top 100 Columbia or Dartmouth or Yale. People attend ivies because they're smart, but also because they have rich parents. Don't discount the latter characteristic as a primary driver of the student population at these schools. And its just different out east. If you're a top student with rich parents in NY or MA, where are you going to go, Binghamton? UMASS? Rutgers? Obviously not because those schools kinda suck, with apologies to any WSO alumni.

Not the case in the Midwest or west Coast where you have loads of public and private options, including the relatively cheap in state option. Unlike the shit public universities out east (UVA excepted), the Big 10 schools are by and large very very good schools. For kids in Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Indiana, Califonia, etc. the college picture is quite different. So when a firm in Chicago "gets the big 10 alumni" its not like it was with a tear in their eye. The fucking MD is probably from a Big 10 school. And he's making just as much cash as any of the MDs anywhere else in the firm.

Full disclosure: I went to an Ivy league school

Very well put. I totally agree. I attended a small private school but most of my friends attended large state schools and I have met a ton of top notch, genuine genius level people...although none wanted to work in finance. And, for what it's worth, many friends from HS had 4.0+ GPAs and it seems the more wealthy attended Ivies or well regarded private schools where as the equally qualified yet less affluent went to state schools.

Regards