The 2023 MBA Job Market Is Unkind To Another Elite B-School: Wharton

The Wharton School’s 2023 MBA employment report shows a freezing of median salary and a mild decline in job offers and acceptances

The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania is the latest top B-school to report flat MBA salaries and declining offers in 2023. But that doesn’t tell the whole story.

It’s true that median salary for the MBA Class of 2023 was flat at $175,000, according to the newly released employment report. But the salary breakdown by industry shows that of 13 industries, only three saw actual median salary declines — while most saw increases of a little or a lot. It’s just that finance, where more than one third of Wharton MBAs found work this year, was one of the “littles,” with median salary growing less than 1% to $175K.

Wharton does not report bonuses, so total pay calculations are not possible. But examining the school’s median salaries by industry, there were some significant bright spots — foremost among them that consulting, the school’s No. 2 industry overall, saw salary grow to $190K from $175K. The 28.8% of the class that went to such employers as McKinsey, Bain, and Boston Consulting Group (among other familiar firms) represents a school record, eclipsing the previous record of 27.2% set two years ago. And tech, as battered as the industry has been of late, saw median salary grow 6%, while fintech’s median salary grew 4.8%.

WHARTON MBA CAREER OUTCOMES 2020-2023

Industry	2023%	2023 Median Salary	2022%	2022 Median Salary	2021%	2021 Median Salary	2020%	2020 Median Salary
ALL INDUSTRIES		$175,000		$175,000		$155,000		$150,000
Consulting	28.8%	$190,000	24.3%	$175,000	27.2%	$165,000	24.5%	$165,000
Consumer Products/Retail	0.9%	$128,000	1.6%	$120,000	1.4%	$120,000	5.6%	$122,500/$140,000
Energy	1.3%	$160,000	1.0%	$150,000	0.9%	NA	0.2%	N/A
Financial Services	37.3%	$175,000	38.6%	$173,513	35.1%	$150,000	36.2%	$150,000
Diversified Financial Services	1.1%	$175,000	1.8%	$162,000	2.1%	$125,000	1.4%	$125,000
Hedge Funds	0.9%	$212,500	2.0%	$175,000	1.9%	$150,000	3.2%	$150,000
Investment Banking/Brokerage	14.2%	$175,000	11.7%	$175,000	12.9%	$150,000	12.2%	$150,000
Investment Management	3.8%	$177,500	6.4%	$170,559	3.7%	$150,000	4.5%	$150,000
Private Equity/Buyout Firms	14.0%	$189,322	12.6%	$175,000	11.1%	$167,500	11.9%	$170,000
Venture Capital	3.3%	$180,000	4.1%	$150,000	3.4%	$157,500	3.1%	$171,500
Healthcare	5.4%	$157,500	5.6%	$160,000	5.3%	$131,000	6.7%	$140,000
Manufacturing	1.3%	$125,356	1.3%	$155,000	1.4%	$142,500	0.8%	N/A
Media & Entertainment	1.3%	$157,500	1.3%	$150,000	1.6%	$150,000	1.3%	$150,000
Real Estate	2.2%	$150,000	2.3%	$147,500	2.1%	$130,000	2.9%	$120,000
Social Impact	1.4%	$133,500	1.3%	$135,000	1.2%	$130,000	1.8%	$89,250
Technology	13.5%	$162,750	16.9%	$153,500	18.6%	$141,000	16.2%	$139,345
FinTech	2.2%	$162,500	2.3%	$155,000	1.2%	$152,500	2.1%	$140,000
Legal & Professional Services	2.0%	$215,000	0.8%	NA	0.9%	$190,000	1.8%	$190,000
Future Mobility	0.5%	NA	0.2%	NA	0.5%	NA	NA	NA

Source: Wharton MBA employment reports

PLACEMENT RATES AMONG THE BEST IN A TOUGH YEAR

Median and average salaries as reported by the leading U.S. B-schools have not all been flat. Stanford Graduate School of Business, Michigan Ross School of Business, Duke Fuqua School of Business, UC-Berkeley Haas School of Business, and others have reported notable increases in both starting salaries and total compensation. But there have also been eyebrow-raisers that schools would just as soon move on from. (Looking at you, Harvard Business School.) And one year after reporting a 12.9% median salary jump, for Wharton to have no increase at all certainly qualifies as an eyebrow-raiser.

But MBA employment reports are written to appeal to potential applicants, so they always contain good news to balance the bad. On the bright side, Wharton’s overall placement rates are better than many of its peers. (Especially Harvard.) Of the 688 students seeking jobs out of a class of 917, 97.2% received job offers by three months after graduation, down just a little from 98.7% in 2022 (and 99% in 2021); and 92.3% accepted, down from 96.2% last year (and 96.8% in 2021). These placement rates hold up well in comparison with Wharton’s peers: It is still the case, in 2023, that just about everyone with a Wharton MBA who wants to find a job will find one.

Nor is Wharton’s 75% of grads seeking employment unusual historically. But in raw numbers, the MBA Class of 2023 was the school’s biggest class overall and biggest cohort seeking jobs since … well, since forever, going back more than a decade at least.

WHARTON CLASS SIZE & JOB SEEKERS 2013-2023

Class	Class Size	# Seeking Employment	% Seeking Employment
2013	800	590	73.7%
2014	815	610	74.8%
2015	826	624	75.5%
2016	850	639	75.2%
2017	819	648	79.1%
2018	813	633	77.9%
2019	863	664	76.9%
2020	904	681	75.3%
2021	754	585	77.6%
2022	852	633	74.3%
2023	917	688	75.0%

Source: Wharton MBA employment reports

CONSULTING INTERNSHIPS INCREASED FROM 19% TO 36% OF CLASS THIS SUMMER

Wharton MBAs tend to stay in the Northeast, and in that respect 2023 was no different: nearly half the class, 48.3%, chose the region for work, up from 43% in 2022. However, unlike previous years, the Northeast was not home to the best-paying jobs — that distinction went to the Midwest (Chicago) and Southwest (Dallas, Phoenix), where Whartonites made median salaries of $190K, significant increases for both. Northeast salaries were flat at $175K.

Wharton’s interns in the MBA Class of 2024 were paid slightly less than their predecessors who just graduated: $10,115 weekly, down from $10,417. The highest-paid interns were those in investment banking ($14,583), and the lowest in entrepreneurial management ($5,633). Finance — consisting of several sub-categories — was the most popular summer job sector, with 36.8% working there; consulting/strategy ($12,783) was next at 36%, up from 19% last year.

See Wharton’s MBA Class of 2023 employment report here.