MBA Pay By U.S. Region: Here’s How Much You’re Worth

It’s back to work, everyone.

By that, we mean back to the office.

Grab your badge, kennel your pooch, and brace for road construction. Remote work is out of favor – and management is cracking down. Forget the days of career cushioning and quiet quitting. Now, your paranoid bosses hold all the leverage. And they haven’t forgotten the times when your peers went MIA. That means no more plugging in from paradise – or trading stocks behind Zoom avatars. Productivity – not flexibility – is the new mantra. So get used to camping out in the office. It’s all community, connection, and collaboration now.

Out of sight is out of mind. You can’t conquer Wall Street from Wyoming or revolutionize tech from Tulsa. You have to go where the jobs are – and those jobs are found in urban skyscrapers and corporate parks, not studio apartments and coffee houses. If you want to make real money starting out, where you live pays dividends. And it pays for MBAs to know exactly how much they’re worth – especially when most will be tethered to a particular location.

WHY LOCATION MATTERS

That’s one reason why most top American MBA programs report pay by region to U.S. News & World Report. Location matters for a variety of reasons. For one, industries often cluster together. Take banking. Not only is New York City the home of Wall Street, but also the headquarters for JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, American Express, and HSBC Bank. That makes for a surplus of expertise, resources, and connections in one place. The same can be said for CPG in the Midwest, where you’ll find Procter & Gamble and Kroger (Ohio), General Mills and 3M (Minnesota), Kellogg (Michigan), Kraft Foods and Conagra (Illinois), and Anheuser-Busch (Missouri). Not surprisingly, the West Coast dominates in the tech industry, where the biggest players are centered around the Bay Area (Apple, Alphabet, Meta, Nvidia, Intel, and HP) and Seattle (Microsoft, Amazon, and Expedia).

Geography also impacts the programming and preferences at business schools. Ever wonder why Northwestern Kellogg, Michigan Ross, Chicago Booth, and Indiana Kelley are considered among the top business schools for marketing? Some of the world’s top CPG companies are a morning drive away. As a result, these schools can more easily partner with top firms for student projects, internships, speakers, adjuncts, and site visits. At Stanford GSB, a combined 27% of the Class of 2024 landed jobs in Venture Capital and Private Equity. That’s hardly a surprise considering Sand Hill Road – where you’ll find most of the industry’s biggest benefactors along a 5.5-mile stretch – is just 5 minutes from campus. The same can be said for tech at UC Berkeley’s Haas School, where firms like Amazon and Adobe gobbled up a 24.3% share of the Class of 2024.

Looking for the best place to earn the biggest pay? That’s easy: The Northeast and the Southwest. In both regions, there were 8 MBA programs where 2024 graduates earned $170,000 or more. The difference? There were another 10 schools whose graduates pulled in total pay from $160,000-$169,999 in the Northeast. Compare that to the Southwest, where just 3 MBA programs averaged in that second range. Beyond that, in the Northeast, the highest earners came from Stanford GSB MBAs, who collected in $190,255. In the Southwest, the honor belonged to MIT’s Sloan School ($184,417), with Stanford producing the best-paid 2024 grads in the Mid-Atlantic, South, Midwest, and West Coast. Across all regions, Stanford GSB grads earned the highest starting pay packages at $206,955, edging out Chicago Booth ($204,099).

A SCHOOL-BY-SCHOOL AND REGION-BY-REGION BREAKDOWN

Inside the numbers, you’ll find plenty of surprises. In the Northeast, Boston College’s highest-paid MBA grad hauled in $215,000 in total pay, better than the highest-paid grads from Yale SOM and Northwestern Kellogg. In the South, the University of Florida’s Warrington College and the University of Miami’s Herbert Business School enjoyed serious homefield advantage. At the top, their MBAs earned $192,000 to start – better than the best pay packages divvyed out to graduates from NYU Stern and Dartmouth Tuck in the region. The same could be said for the University of Minnesota’s Carlson School, whose highest-paid grad working in the Midwest cleared $195,000 – or $2,000 more than the highest-paid Wharton grad in the Heartland. On the West Coast, a graduate from the University of Michigan’s Ross School reeled in a $300,000 starting package. And a Georgia Tech Scheller grad negotiated a $312,000 deal – proof positive that there is wiggle room with some companies.

Alas, regional pay has some flaws in terms of helping MBAs navigate pay parameters. For one, there is always cost of living. A dollar goes far further in the South and Midwest than either coast – and employers account for that in their offers. Sample size also makes an impact. Indiana University’s Kelley School placed graduates across every region – a difficult feat that’s a testament to its career center’s reach. Still, Kelley’s Mid-Atlantic and West Coast pay data is based on packages received by 5 and 4 graduates respectively. And size is an issue dogging even the biggest schools. Exhibit A: NYU Stern, whose Mid-Atlantic, South, Midwest, Southwest and West Coast pay averages are based on a combined 22 graduates (Compared to the 169 graduates who make up Stern’s Northeast hires). Of course, there are additional enticements not factored into reported pay package – 401K, end-of-year bonuses, health insurance coverage, and vacation pay – that can vary widely between employers. Even more, the numbers don’t include intangible elements that can set up graduates up for bigger paydays: higher-level access, greater responsibilities early on, and ongoing training and mentorship.

As a whole, regional pay has value for MBAs. Even though the numbers fold in all industries, it reflects just how much a generic employer might be willing to pay – particularly on the high side. For applicants, pay numbers – or their absence – also indicates whether a school offers an alumni base who can open doors in various regions. Either way, it is an entry point towards more detailed information.

Wondering how your target schools fare in various regions? Click on the regional links for a school-by-school comparison of average pay, along with high and low packages, across American regions.

NORTHEAST

MID-ATLANTIC

SOUTH

MIDWEST

SOUTHWEST

WEST COAST

OVERALL MBA PAY BY SCHOOL

 

Editor’s Note: These are the states that constitute each region.

Northeast: Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont

Mid-Atlantic: District of Columbia, Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia

South: Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee

Midwest: Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, North Dakota, Nebraska, Ohio, South Dakota, Wisconsin

Southwest:  Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas

West: Alaska, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, Washington, Wyoming

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