Reasonable careers for Math Major

[Anonymous]

DC is a math major and will be working at McKinsey.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:What level of college/program? What minor? What electives? What personal skilled interests/hobbies?

Undergrad in pure math is a professionally useless liberal art degree. It's a gateway to science and technology like History is for law school applications. It's a general foundational education, not vocational. It's an enhancer to your other skills, not a skill in itself.
You need to combine it with something.

Entry level jobs include actuary, auditor, something in data analysis, teacher in a district desperate for staff.
If you have a secondary interest, more options open.

you people are utterly clueless, this is why you don’t get your advice from the bone heads of DCUM.

This is a pretty reasonable response actually. The people who go from math degree to CS are overwelmingly CS double majors or students who had a deep interest in computer science. You don't walk into a computer science career willy nilly and do need the technical skills. Combinatorics and Galois Theory doesn't just create Python script alone.

IDK about that. I was required to program in my 400 level math classes and "walked" into a IT job straight from undergraduate Math.

OP said pure math. Pure math is not programming.

What kind of IT job? Did you have any out of class IT experience?

I went into software development but not a programmer. I was am now a project manager of a large agile development team.

NP

I went straight into programming, then to computer support, then to project management, then contract management for a large contractor.

[Anonymous]

Attorney.

Some of the best lawyers I know were math majors. They are able to juggle various options and arguments in their head at the same and are masters of logic thinking.

[Anonymous]

As shown by everyone here, math is a liberal arts major and so there isn’t a path you adhere to. It’s much more helpful to take apples math coursework as a lot of pure math (topology, number theory, complex analysis) are more helpful for scientific research/mathematical research, but that may not be the most beneficial if you aren’t seeking a graduate degree.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Attorney.

Pure mathematicians write proofs and are deeply analytical, which means they can disentangle and construct complex legal arguments and agreements with relative ease. I'll support hiring an attorney with a math (or math/philosophy) background any day over an otherwise comparable applicant with a poli sci degree. I feel comfortable putting them to serious work earlier. I think the challenge is often partner-track for math attorneys who are not government counsel, as they are more law-minded than client-minded.

This is a bad idea, because law is illogical, imprecise, and contradictory, so a mathematician will get poor results attempting a legal analysis.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As shown by everyone here, math is a liberal arts major and so there isn’t a path you adhere to. It’s much more helpful to take apples math coursework as a lot of pure math (topology, number theory, complex analysis) are more helpful for scientific research/mathematical research, but that may not be the most beneficial if you aren’t seeking a graduate degree.

On the other hand, a student who does well in pure math can learn applications on the side easily.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DC is a math major and will be working at McKinsey.

From what college?

[Anonymous]

My DS is at a public ivy and is double majoring in applied math and philosophy. He is attending the one weeks sessions at two quant firms this spring. He is a sophomore.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One of DS's friends was a math major and now he works for the CIA. No idea of the specific job.

Secret Service will be hiring geometry specialists to figure out the sloped roof problem.

Made me think of Analytical Geometry jobs ... a 2025 CS/Math grad from CMU landed a pretty decent paying job in this field.