Thursday, 20 August 2009

  • Want To Be a Billionaire? Go To One of These Schools...


    Apparently, if you want to be a billionaire, your best bet is to get at least one degree from Harvard. Forbes Magazine looked at its most recent list of the world's billionaires and analyzed the 469 Americans on the list. They realized that 50 of the billionaires received at least one degree from Harvard, making it the Number 1 school that produces American billionaires. Its 50 alumni is 20 more than the runner-up, Stanford, that claims 30 billionaire alumni.

    The rest of the top 10 is filled with the expected Ivy League Schools. In fact, just 20 schools account for 52% of the American billionaire alumni. The top 10 is rounded out by these schools:  

    2. Stanford
    3. University of Pennsylvania
    4. Yale
    5. Columbia
    6. Princeton
    7. NYU and University of Chicago
    8. Cornell, MIT, Northwestern, Berkeley, UCLA,  and USC.

    It's easy to chalk this up to privilege leading to more privilege. After all, these represent some of the most elite schools in the country. These are the very same institutions that the wealthiest families send their children to, after preparing them at the most elite high schools. So it doesn't seem that surprising that wealthy families would end up with wealthy children.

    But I feel like that doesn't account for the advantages of the schools themselves. The article credits the following factors for making these school billionaire-makers:

    1. Quality of Education
    2. Specialized Programs (business schools are much more likely to produce high-earning alumni)
    3. Strong Tech Research Programs
    4. Selectivity (choosing the brightest students possible)
    5. Networking possibilities

    These reasons make a lot of sense to me because they account for the entrepreneurs and other people self-made men. I can't deny that background can play a role, but the idealistic part of me would like to believe that becoming a billionaire has more to do with your own choices and experience than your family's wealth.

    What do you think? Which factors are more important: background or schools' factors?


    See the full article here: http://www.forbes.com/2008/05/19/billionaires-harvard-education-biz-billies-cx_af_0519billieu.html



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Comments (5)

  • danicadelacruz@xanga

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  • alentini@xanga

    What comes first -the chicken or the egg? Harvard does not "produce" billionaires. Billionaires go to Harvard. Often times, "name brand" schools -like any other product reflect the people who frequent them. Take a look at these billionaires and their families and you may find that they were well heeled to begin with. They will go on and get great paying jobs because of their already existing rich connections.

    Sure, you may go to Harvard to rub elbows with the rich, but its kind of like joining an over-priced country club hoping to meet a rich "Mr. Right."

    You think Harvard holds its weight in gold? You think its worth spending 80K and getting into student loan debt in order to have a crack at being a billionaire at a hoity toity school? Check out the poll on College Is For Suckers...
  • SoullFire@xanga

    One must be careful with determining causal relationships. I'm sure a list can be made of the top ten cities billionaires live and the top ten restaurants they eat at, but that doesn't automatically mean one has better odds of being rich by living in a certain city or eating at a certain restaurant.
  • Kaythan@xanga

    My dad went to Columbia and I can say that he is definitely no billionaire lol. 
  • princesscrystalx@xanga

    it's kind of like a avalanche effect, the rich get richer, the elite go to good schools, schools become better because rich alumni donate money to their alma mater.


    it's more up to the individual than the school, though. there's an old chinese saying that goes, personality defines fate. i firmly believe in that.

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