Why Standford’s MBAs earn twice as much as others

It’s harder to get into Stanford than Harvard or Wharton-Penn: The school’s admissions rate is just 5.1 per cent, compared with 9.6 per cent for Harvard and 12.7 per cent for Wharton-Penn. But Stanford is desirable for many students not only because of its highly effective alumni network and small class sizes but also because graduates earn double the amount the average MBA earns.

According to Bloomberg, Stanford is the most exclusive MBA programme in the world. “When people go to recruit at Stanford, they recognise they’re getting candidates who probably got offers from Harvard and Wharton,” Jay Bhatti, a venture capitalist, told Bloomberg.

After graduating from Stanford MBAs are earning an average of 285,000 U.S. dollars within six to eight years. But what are the reasons for this high average income?

Many start working in the San Francisco Bay Area and in the close-by Silicon Valley – Google’s and Facebook’s headquarters are less than seven miles away for example, where many successful companies are located.
Their attitude reportedly also catapults them into high-earning jobs as they seem to rather follow their dreams than just go for the biggest income resulting in them eventually earning more than others.
Many students – a high number from other countries – start successful businesses of their own. Examples are Phil Knight (founder, Nike), Charles Schwab (founder, Charles Schwab), Joe Coulombe (founder, Trader Joe's), Nolan Bushnell (founder, Atari, Chuck E. Cheese), Vinod Khosla (cofounder, Sun Microsystems) and Richard Fairbank (founder, Capital One)

Read more on Bloomberg and Time

Barbara Barkhausen