Actually, those number are real. I'm entering one of those "M7" places and the budget is over 75K a year.
Here you go: http://www.chicagogsb.edu/fulltime/admissions/costs.aspx They might have overestimated certain things, but that looks somewhat accurate. Most of the other top schools have similar costs. I have never heard of tuition ever going down, but I would welcome that. 250K for someone who is 24 is a lot of money.
Population wise? I guess if you count the whole bay area then sure its bigger, but Austin is about the same size a SF in the city. And yes, austin's nightlife blows SF's away.
New piece of information... 24 is pretty young. I would even more strongly suggest to go for it then. The longer you wait, the more comfortable you get, and the most tied down you are financially (relationship / family, house, etc.)... that makes going to school even harder.
if you're that worried about cost and the opportunity cost of going to b-school, then why don't you look into a night program? if you're in houston Rice, UT, Tulane, and U of H all have a night and weekend program. you can earn your MBA and work at the same time. that way you won't lose out on the salary while you're working. OR as an alternative, work at a deal with your company to pay for the MBA school. a lot of companies will cover the cost of an MBA provided that you work a number of years once you attain your degree. that way, you don't have to pay the tuition expense.
But there's way more to do in SF, better/more diverse food options, etc. When talking about cities, SF is generally mentioned with the likes of NYC, Chicago, LA, etc. -- Austin is generally mentioned with the likes of Portland, Seattle (i.e. Smaller cities).
I wasn't talking about restaurants, sights, and culture. There's no comparison there. I was simply talking about nightlife. The number of bars/lounges/clubs per capita is much higher in Austin than out here in SF. For such a world class city, SF is lacking in cool spots. There's a couple of decent spots in the Marina, SOMA, and North Beach but they don't compare to the diverse mix of bars packed with sluts between 4th, 5th, West 6th and 6th Street. I'm still looking for the Aquarium or Spill of SF. The search has been unsuccessful thus far.
It depends on if you want to go into management at a large corporation. An mba doesn't get you crap unless you willing to take a job that requires it. If you don't want to be a consultant or you don't want to get into middle/upper management, then a mba is a waste of time and money.
I would really challenge that. Business school is management period, not necessary large corporation. I don't have the data, but I'm sure a large percentage of people start their own companies, or don't do traditional "management" jobs.
If you look at what Air Langi just posted, the budget includes meals, living, health expense, etc. I understand that this comes out of your budget, but he has to pay for these things regardless. Just from the standpoint of "losing" money, it's not 75k per year based solely on MBA fees. It's more like 50k for tuition and expenses per year, so 100k total.
I went to WP Carey at Arizona State. Tuition was around 50k for the entire thing. It is also a top 30 MBA school.
Now my quesion is, what do people who go through JD-MBA programs do? How hard is it to get into a JD-MBA program, say at USC or UCLA? Do you have to pay more money?
My manager and I talk about the merits of MBAs now all the time. In our company (a large Fortune 100 company) we have found that *mostly* work experience and delivery of projects does the most to get people hired or promoted. We both think, however, that a business school grad degree really does help once it may come time in your career to try to promote to upper management. Out of the dozen or so upper managers (Jr. executive and above) that we know, almost all of them have some kind of post graduate degree, whether its a Masters in Accounting and CPA or an MBA.
OrangeRowdy, I'm a JD/MBA at Northwestern currently. Usually, you have to get into both the JD and MBA programs separately. So you have to apply to both. In general it takes 4 years to get both degrees and yes, you do pay more than for just one degree. What you do with it is entirely up to you. Generally though - you have to do something non-mainstream to get the right ROI. Because if you just get a normal MBA job or a normal JD job, there was no point in getting both degrees.
