Shortly after ascending to the top five in Bloomberg BusinessWeek’s latest annual ranking of best U.S. business schools, Dartmouth’s Tuck School of Business released its 2016 employment statistics.
Contributing to its strong showing in the Bloomberg BW ranking was the annual salary reported by Tuck grads. According to the latest employment stats released by the school, graduates of the Class of 2016 pulled down an average annual starting salary of $123,934. More than a third of the class—36 percent—headed into the consulting industry, up slightly from 34 percent last year. Among those, the average starting salary was higher still, at $133,202, although down from last year’s average $137,277. A whopping 87 percent of the class also reported getting signing bonuses averaging $28,962.
The highest reported starting salary among Tuck 2016 graduates—$250,000—went to a student headed into private equity/venture capital, a path followed by just two percent of the class. The financial services industry as a whole drew 20 percent of the class, down from 24 percent the year before. Technology was third, drawing 16 percent of the class, again a slight downturn from last year’s 18 percent. Consumer goods/retail, at 13 percent, attracted three percent more students this year than last. Healthcare/biotech/pharma dropped from six percent last year to four percent this year, and manufacturing rose to four percent from two percent.
Around 89 percent of Tuck graduates took jobs in the United States upon graduation. The majority of those—52 percent—stayed in the Northeast, mostly split between the Boston and New York City metro areas. About 15 percent of graduates moved out West for their new employment opportunities, while eight percent moved to the Midwest, five percent moved to the Mid-Atlantic region of the country and another nine percent moved to the South and Southeastern regions.
Timing
Within three months of graduating, 96 percent of all Tuck ‘16 MBAs managed to secure job offers—a figure that includes the significant portion of the class without permanent U.S. work authorization. Last year, a whopping 99 percent of the Class of 2015 had job offers within three months of graduation, again including those without permanent U.S. work authorization.
Highly-Compensated Internships
As for internships, 24 percent of the Class of 2017 spent their summers working in the financial services industry, followed by 21 percent in consulting. These interns pulled in average monthly salaries of $9,098 and $10,440 respectively. After financial services and consulting, the majority of Tuck MBAs interned in the industries of technology (16 percent), consumer goods and retail (12 percent), healthcare/biotech/pharma (nine percent) and manufacturing (six percent). Also included in the final tally were the media, energy and non-profit industries.
A Year of Modest Improvement
Across the board, employed Tuck graduates and interns enjoyed modest financial increases this past year. Overall average starting annual salaries inched up a mere $34 compared to the previous year, while interns’ pay jumped from an average $7,966 to $8,261 per month.
The biggest difference between the ‘15 and ‘16 graduating classes was, perhaps surprisingly, the number of graduates employed in the United States, which jumped from 79 percent last year to 89 percent this year.
Note: Employment statistics released so far by Tuck for 2015-2016 do not reveal details about specific hiring companies. Of the Class of 2015, McKinsey and Co. hired the most Tuck graduates (17), with Bain and Co.(16), Amazon (11) and Deloitte (10) rounding out the top four.
