Do NOT under any circumstances go to a tier-2 business school or below. It's top 7 or nothing. Don't even go to a lower-tier-1 business school. Don't go to the #9 or #10 ranked b-school. The whole MBA-explosion is a big problem. And you get ONE CHANCE to brand your CV academically. Go to a tier 1 b-school or don't go at all. Simple.
And ideally, go to the b-school that specializes in what you want to do. If you want to do real estate, you probably want to just go to Wharton for example. If you want to work in Silicon Valley, you probably only want to go to Stanford. By the time you're ready to apply to b-school you should only have a max of 4 schools on your application list, and you want to swamp those applications with your attention.
That's an absurd recommendation. Some T15 provide similar opportunities to the M7 and also have strong brand names. Especially thinking about Tuck, Fuqua, and Stern.
If you are a top tier candidate this is great advice. Don't settle.
If you are an average Joe this is terrible advice, you need to be realistic. T15-T20 depending on what you can get on your GMAT, what your grades are, or what job you have.
Anything less don't waste your money at all just hustle.
As someone who went to a non-M7 top 15 MBA, I think you're not qualifying your statement enough. Your point is not wrong per se, but it is completely dependent on what your goals are. If your goal is to become a partner at a PE fund, I would agree. However, there are many other career goals that a non-M7 MBA can be incredibly helpful for. For instance, in my industry (CPG), going to HBS would actually be less helpful from a network perspective, as very few HBS alumni enter the industry.
I also think you're being a bit black and white in your analysis. It's not just "MBB partner or nothing". The analysis should be career track before MBA vs. career track post-MBA minus costs. To put it down to just $$ (which I think is silly but seems to be most WSO members' focus), it would be career earnings pre-MBA (projected) vs. earnings post-MBA (projected), minus the cost of the MBA. You can even assign "credit" to the MBA by discounting the post-MBA earnings based on how "helpful" the MBA was in achieving them. In that analysis, there are plenty of people for whom it would "make sense" (i.e. positive NPV) to go to a non-M7 MBA.
OP is a bit too black and white. It’s really all about the law of averages.
I agree that on average, higher ranked MBA programs give students more options to succeed with more resources, better networks, smarter classmates and better overall brand value. That isn’t to say top students outside the M7 (T10 - T25+) can’t achieve the same level of success as students in the M7, just that on average they don’t. But part of it is what the school has to offer, but also the students themselves. The M7s on average have higher student quality and schools that offer more.
However, I find the top ~20% at T15 programs (sometimes more, sometimes less) are often very strong, motivated students who could have attended M7 programs but picked T15 schools for special reasons (money, location, specific school focus, etc..). Often these students do just as well as those in the M7, these students would do well anywhere.
Want to do banking and can’t get into CBS (or don't want to pay for it)? Stern will get you there almost as good as/sometimes better than certain M7s. For consulting, say Kellogg is out of reach? Tuck, Darden or Ross would work very well. Want tech but Stanford is out of reach? Haas is a great option. Love Texas BBQ (who doesn’t) and interested in Oil and Gas? McCombs is an easy option that may miss on due to the rankings. The T15s that do well have a specific focus they excel in it, created a brand around it with strong alums in that area, a solid recruiter base, and eager students who can place there just as well as their M7 compatriots.
IMO, going to a T15 with a nice scholarship that excel in your focus area can make as much sense as going to an M7 that isn’t as strong in that area where you pay full tuition.
Of course, not all non-M7 schools are created equal. The ones to avoid are the ones without a focus, that constantly launch new endeavors with no traction and aren’t known for anything except their parent University. The further out you go from the T10/T15, the more you’ll see these types b-school programs. They try to do everything without really achieving success in anything (despite their admission office claiming otherwise), present overly general career services reports and rely on their parent University way too much.
Admission offices always trout out their best and brightest students. When looking at a school, trying to look at all student profiles (esp those there with no scholarships) and speaking to 2nd years who aren’t as juiced up as the 1st year school ambassadors or recent alums. Its important to understand what the non-M7 school is good at and what it isn’t.
Sure I paint in black and white because we're deep in WSO clickbait land. But I think I'm decently positioned to opine on this because I took up a lower top-10 MBA at age 24, whereas if I'd waited I think a top 7 was certainly viable. And while many of my classmates incredibly well, we did this with limited help from brand and network. Did everyone's salaries jump? Sure. For some people is seeing a 2-3x on your salary a good reason to do an MBA? Sure. Just know what you're getting, and what you're giving up, because it's a one-shot deal. Because once you're 15 years in, are your allumni connections running top PE shops and tech companies, or are they in mid-senior mgmt at a corporate 1000. And that's an aspect I'm increasingly aware of.