During times of economic distress, it's common for people to go back to school. But when it comes to MBA programs, things may be still be gloomy.
Bear in mind that these programs rely heavily on endowments. And when the investment market was bubbly, the returns were lush -- and so were the MBA programs.
However, things have deteriorated over the past year (especially in Q4), even for big-time endowments like Harvard and Yale. As a result, many MBA programs are cutting back on staff and programs. At the same time, there's been reductions in executive programs (that is, corporations are pulling back on sponsorships).
Of course, the other problem is that the US is undergoing a big reduction in white-collar jobs, such as in the financial services sector. No doubt MBA programs relied on the gravy train of investment banks, hedge funds and private equity operators. Now this has mostly gone away, making it more difficulty to attract new students and putting even more pressure on MBA programs.
Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
2-03-2009 @ 3:06PM
Toy Yoda said...
I guess all of them will be herding towards medical school.
2-04-2009 @ 11:57AM
David Frasier said...
I guess you've been missing the other side of the story - full time programs. Applications to these programs are trending up anywhere from 15% to 50%. The number of people taking the GMAT test is through the roof for the year, at the highest number since 1968, following the trend of test taker numbers being inversely proportional to unemployment numbers at the valleys.