At Harvard, a graduate who gave up his full scholarship to another university told me he felt immense pressure to prove to his parents, who had invested $400,000 in his Harvard education, that he could land a job making $1 million a year. After graduation, he plans to join the private equity firm Blackstone, believing he can learn and accomplish more in six years than he could in 30 years working for a public-service-oriented organization.
Another student from Uruguay, who practiced case studies for two years straight to prepare for an internship interview in management consulting, told me that when he comes to campus, everyone wants to change the world. But what he learns at Harvard, he said, is that it’s too hard to actually do anything meaningful. He told me that people give up on their dreams and decide they’d be better off making money. Another told me that he often hears peers at parties say they just want to be successful.
“There’s definitely a herd mentality,” said Joshua Parker, 21, a Harvard junior from Oahu. “If you’re not working in finance or tech, it can sometimes feel like you’re doing something wrong.”
As a freshman, he planned to major in environmental engineering. By his sophomore year, he switched to economics and was joined by five of his six roommates. One of them told me he wanted to run a hedge fund by his 30s. By then, he hoped to be earning a handsome salary of $500,000 a year.
According to a Harvard Crimson survey of Harvard seniors, 34% of the Class of 2024 will go into finance or consulting. (In 2022 and 2023, that figure rose to over 40%. Harvard’s official survey includes students who don’t enter the workforce, so the percentages in those fields are lower than in the Crimson survey.)
