What MBA Grads Made This Year

The economy remains wobbly. Unemployment is still stubbornly high. Wall Street is in the midst of laying off thousands of employees. No wonder, applications to the business schools are down and some are debating the value of the MBA degree.

But the latest numbers on median starting salaries for MBA graduates in the Class of 2012 are nothing less than eye opening. It's not surprising that the highest salaries are for graduates of Stanford, Harvard and Wharton, where staring base pay was $125,000 to $120,000, without signing bonuses, guaranteed compensation or reimbursed tuition.

The really surprising stats show that the MBA degree--despite its lack of scarcity at this point--is the best way to super charge income earning ability. While it’s true that in most cases year-over-year starting salaries for MBAs have remained flat or shown meager growth, the impact of the degree is that it significantly boosts your pre-MBA pay.

Many of the largest returns occurred not at Harvard or Stanford, where incoming students typically leave jobs that pay fairly high salaries to start with, but at very good business schools that are not at the top of the prestige heap.

This year’s MBAs reporting the largest percentage increases over their pre-MBA salaries graduated from Michigan State’s Broad School (a whopping 268.6% increase from what they had earned before getting the degree), Notre Dame’s Mendoza School (up 148.8%), the University of Minnesota’s Carlson School (up 132.2%), the University of North Carolina’s Kenan-Flagler Business School (up 122.2%), and Indiana University’s Kelley School (up 119.6%).

The increases over pre-MBA salary remain impressive–and at many schools are astonishing given the still uncertain economy in the U.S. At seven of 30 top schools, graduates either doubled or more than doubled their pre-MBA pay. At 22 of the 30 schools, graduates reported at least a 50% increase in starting pay–and again these figures do not include signing bonuses, guaranteed year-end bonuses, or tuition reimbursements.

To see what MBA graduates are earning this year at 30 schools, as well as the percentage increases over their pre-MBA pay, see our complete story at PoetsandQuants.com: What The Class of 2012 Made