Selingo WSJ Essay

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These articles focus on career “success” and not money “success”.

The insurance policy is that the graduates have rich friends and/or marry someone rich. How many parents on this board earned their 1% vs married their 1%? I am semi-successful professsionally from a meh-private college; my money comes from my husband’s family, not my career.

Sure if your only goal for your kids is that they enter the 1% and marry rich - you should sweat getting them into Princeton. I don’t think that is the only goal most parents have for their kids. Maybe I am wrong.

It isn’t marrying rich for me. It’s being around the right cohort. It matters in the long run.

If you want to make lifelong connections to the "right cohort" you should put energy in getting your kid into the "right" K-8 or K-12. The lifelong friendships are made then, and private school students at elite colleges often hang with other kids who went to similar private elementary/high schools. Elite college is cliquey but in kindergarten the kids are so young they don't care. That's been my experience having gone to private K-12 in NYC myself, putting my kids through that now, and having one at so-called "top 20" elite college now.

Don't worry. We did that too.
Two kids at Ivy/T10 now.
All good.

[Anonymous]

Are the waitlist admits and waitlisted-but-not-admitted groups really comparable? At elite universities waitlists are often need-aware even if the school is otherwise need blind. And private high schools are known to communicate with colleges about waitlist kids in a way they don’t do for the ED or RD cycles. Given all that I’d think the group of kids enrolled off the waitlist would be materially different from the kids waitlisted but not enrolled.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These articles focus on career “success” and not money “success”.

The insurance policy is that the graduates have rich friends and/or marry someone rich. How many parents on this board earned their 1% vs married their 1%? I am semi-successful professsionally from a meh-private college; my money comes from my husband’s family, not my career.

If the 1% make up a lot of the graduates, these kids are already in the 1%. They don’t need to go to college to make those friends. They already knew them in HS.

They no longer do, and the schools with the most are no longer the Ivy+.
The top 1% were about 17-18% of undergrads at ivy+ in an article using 2013 data! It was published in 2017 and again in 2021 but used data from the graduating class of 2013. The Ivys faced a lot of negative press from it and made changes, especially since 2020.

WashU, Colby, W&L, SMU had higher portions of undergrads in the top1% than ivys at the time: upwards of 24%. WashU is now much lower because they faced backlash in the round after the ivy backlash for the same thing. Pell grand, FGLI, %on need based aid, need-blind admissions are all pushed and broadcast loudly as goals by the top schools: WashU is right on the cusp of the T15ish group and has made, IMO, positive changes to prioritize socioeconomic equity in admissions.
Since the 2013 data, top colleges especially ivys have redoubled efforts to admit more pell grant kids, expand aid and promote equity. The ivys are MUCH LESS 1% (and less top 5%) heavy than they were 10 years ago yet still proportionally lead to higher likelihood of garnering jobs at MMB, top tech, or acceptance to top law, top med. Schools with the highest proportion of the 1% are not ivys and do not have results at the ivy level.

Hence outcomes these days are less about the proportion of 1% and more a factor of certain companies targeting top schools for efficiency purposes as well as the students of these top schools skew heavily toward the highest intelligence based on proportions: it is no surprise they have the highest LSAT and MCAT distributions. However a very top kid from a T50ish who had the stats and got admission or at least WL to a T15 can likely end up in a similar place, minus maybe a handful or two of companies that target name brands.

So the 1% are overrepresented. There are a lot more of them there than you would expect or find. But if the cohort is poorer and less connected, coupled with the less fun environment there's not much reason for the 1% to go to those schools. What's in it for them?

It's why schools like Wake and Tulane are growing more popular.

For the Pell group, sure, it's great from a social mobility perspective for those kids in the long term, but it makes for a horribly bifurcated social life and cliquey campus life (have any of you stepped on these campuses lately? it's a case of the haves (goyard totes, VCA, Cartier bracelets, Fendi baguettes, GG shoes on the girls) and have-nots) - Vanderbilt, anyone?
The groups are formed in the first week. With Greek life's growing importance (even off campus at schools like Duke), your Pell grant kid is NOT moving into that social circle in college. Ever. Its not happened. Yes, they'll form their own circle, but let's not pretend this experiment is kumbaya and everyone is friends together.
It is absolutely not like that.
People need a giant wake-up call.

Oh come on. Wake and Tulane are not being picked by the 1% who actually had a kid also get into an ivy.

We know a private HS kid who ED to Wake, who absolutely could have gotten into private T20....wanted fun, social, and non-bot/nerdy vibe that wasn't a large flagship. Very few real options.

Are you in a public-school immigrant bubble? If so, that would explain your disbelief. It's way more common than you think.

No. Top private day school in the northeast with very wealthy families and about 10-15% of graduates go to ivy/duke/stanford. Wake is for the above average ED, a backup RD for the top, and Tulane ED is for the bottom 1/2. Truly. No one who is truly ivy-level ends up at wake unless they are very unlucky in admissions to T20. Tulane has very few applications from the top 1/2. We have detailed Scoir data by uw and w gpa and the kids know their deciles in 11th grade.

This is a very northeast mindset. Kids everywhere else don't care about these schools as much.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These articles focus on career “success” and not money “success”.

The insurance policy is that the graduates have rich friends and/or marry someone rich. How many parents on this board earned their 1% vs married their 1%? I am semi-successful professsionally from a meh-private college; my money comes from my husband’s family, not my career.

If the 1% make up a lot of the graduates, these kids are already in the 1%. They don’t need to go to college to make those friends. They already knew them in HS.

They no longer do, and the schools with the most are no longer the Ivy+.
The top 1% were about 17-18% of undergrads at ivy+ in an article using 2013 data! It was published in 2017 and again in 2021 but used data from the graduating class of 2013. The Ivys faced a lot of negative press from it and made changes, especially since 2020.

WashU, Colby, W&L, SMU had higher portions of undergrads in the top1% than ivys at the time: upwards of 24%. WashU is now much lower because they faced backlash in the round after the ivy backlash for the same thing. Pell grand, FGLI, %on need based aid, need-blind admissions are all pushed and broadcast loudly as goals by the top schools: WashU is right on the cusp of the T15ish group and has made, IMO, positive changes to prioritize socioeconomic equity in admissions.
Since the 2013 data, top colleges especially ivys have redoubled efforts to admit more pell grant kids, expand aid and promote equity. The ivys are MUCH LESS 1% (and less top 5%) heavy than they were 10 years ago yet still proportionally lead to higher likelihood of garnering jobs at MMB, top tech, or acceptance to top law, top med. Schools with the highest proportion of the 1% are not ivys and do not have results at the ivy level.

Hence outcomes these days are less about the proportion of 1% and more a factor of certain companies targeting top schools for efficiency purposes as well as the students of these top schools skew heavily toward the highest intelligence based on proportions: it is no surprise they have the highest LSAT and MCAT distributions. However a very top kid from a T50ish who had the stats and got admission or at least WL to a T15 can likely end up in a similar place, minus maybe a handful or two of companies that target name brands.

So the 1% are overrepresented. There are a lot more of them there than you would expect or find. But if the cohort is poorer and less connected, coupled with the less fun environment there's not much reason for the 1% to go to those schools. What's in it for them?

It's why schools like Wake and Tulane are growing more popular.

For the Pell group, sure, it's great from a social mobility perspective for those kids in the long term, but it makes for a horribly bifurcated social life and cliquey campus life (have any of you stepped on these campuses lately? it's a case of the haves (goyard totes, VCA, Cartier bracelets, Fendi baguettes, GG shoes on the girls) and have-nots) - Vanderbilt, anyone?
The groups are formed in the first week. With Greek life's growing importance (even off campus at schools like Duke), your Pell grant kid is NOT moving into that social circle in college. Ever. Its not happened. Yes, they'll form their own circle, but let's not pretend this experiment is kumbaya and everyone is friends together.
It is absolutely not like that.
People need a giant wake-up call.

Oh come on. Wake and Tulane are not being picked by the 1% who actually had a kid also get into an ivy.

We know a private HS kid who ED to Wake, who absolutely could have gotten into private T20....wanted fun, social, and non-bot/nerdy vibe that wasn't a large flagship. Very few real options.

Are you in a public-school immigrant bubble? If so, that would explain your disbelief. It's way more common than you think.

No. Top private day school in the northeast with very wealthy families and about 10-15% of graduates go to ivy/duke/stanford. Wake is for the above average ED, a backup RD for the top, and Tulane ED is for the bottom 1/2. Truly. No one who is truly ivy-level ends up at wake unless they are very unlucky in admissions to T20. Tulane has very few applications from the top 1/2. We have detailed Scoir data by uw and w gpa and the kids know their deciles in 11th grade.

Interesting. Exact opposite re Wake v Tulane in my Texas experience. One kid at private, one at public magnet.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The essay kind of talks out two sides. Says the elite schools don’t matter in the end, but then also says graduates of elite schools are 60% more likely to end up at elite jobs (think he used Goldman as an example) and secure higher salaries out of undergrad.

Also, it shows a chart that says out of a Microsoft pool of entry level employees, 3500 out of around 12,000 come from colleges with 20% or less acceptance rates. It’s the largest group though that leaves 8500 employees coming from less selective schools.

Again, the issue with this is that there are only like 25 colleges (most of which are relatively small) that fit this criteria while there are thousands that fit the other criteria of higher acceptance rates.

My takeaway was that at Microsoft it definitely pays to come from a sub-20% acceptance college.

I also don’t get looking at Fortune 50 companies as a good measure. Outside of tech, you just won’t see many top school grads wanting to work at Exxon or CVS or a good 30 of the F50 companies.

I think you missed the point. The point is that “elite” jobs are not the only possible career path (the example of regional employees recruiting from regional schools); and that not going to an elite school does not completely bar you from an “elite” job. IOW - the panic is not justified unless you are deadset on maximizing your child’s changes of working at Goldmans (which is a pretty pathetic way to parent but you do you).

I also think the vignette about the job at Illumination was great. mainly because she ended up with an absolute dream job (designing rides at Universal, OMG!!) that is SO much more fun and better than all the miserable money you get working at McKinsey. Which one among us would rather our kid end up a management consultant than designing 3D rides? I hope not many. And also because it shows that while many smart kids to to Ivys there IS a cultural or values issue - privileged kids think they don’t need to do the grunt work or think it is not part of the path to success. I have absolutely seen this at my Ivy law school where it seemed like people literally could not conceive of any path other than BigLaw.

No…I got the point, but such point gets lost when the author points out very distinct advantages of elite schools.

You can’t say it doesn’t matter…and then point out ways it does matter.

BTW, it’s no surprise that Ivy kids are massively over represented in Hollywood in terms of writers, producers, management, etc…but all successful folks in entertainment know you have to put in the work no matter what.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These articles focus on career “success” and not money “success”.

The insurance policy is that the graduates have rich friends and/or marry someone rich. How many parents on this board earned their 1% vs married their 1%? I am semi-successful professsionally from a meh-private college; my money comes from my husband’s family, not my career.

Sure if your only goal for your kids is that they enter the 1% and marry rich - you should sweat getting them into Princeton. I don’t think that is the only goal most parents have for their kids. Maybe I am wrong.

It isn’t marrying rich for me. It’s being around the right cohort. It matters in the long run.

Can you give me an example of how it matters, that you cannot find at another school, that is not related to making money?

I see this in action with my siblings. They all went to large flagship schools and I went to private T10. They do not have friends in the same social class that we do. I’m sorry to be so blunt. Their friends are not as successful.

My siblings have great well paying jobs (due to grad degrees) but just don’t have access to the networks that we do. Could they create that or find it themselves through things like YPO and private clubs? Yes absolutely. But it is much much harder. They complain about it nonstop. I’ve posted about this before, but it’s probably been some time.

This is absurd. My husband and I went to state honors programs. Our college friends are all highly successful and indistinguishable from our DC professional, neighborhood, country club and 55K private school friends.

To echo a pervious poster, unless your aim is working at Goldman Sachs directly out of undergrad you can find as much network as you need at any top100 (or even below) college and then you will build your network via your professional career and social life. How much college "network" does any one person need? Answer: not much.

We have the GS/PE/HF type of jobs. That’s our circle.

Listen, your experiences may differ.

There’s no one right way, but I’ve seen firsthand. There is a large cohort difference .

I regret to inform you, likely to your great dismay, that there are many people from state colleges in those circles.

I’m sure. At the MD level though, I don’t see it in my circle in a large metro area.
Maybe elsewhere, yes.

So your entire goal is for your kid to be a managing director of an investment bank? What an extremely sad and morally bankrupt life goal. For you and your kid. (and also - my very successful finance relatives and friends went to state schools so I doubt what you are saying. My guess is you are a SAHM and don’t actually know.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These articles focus on career “success” and not money “success”.

The insurance policy is that the graduates have rich friends and/or marry someone rich. How many parents on this board earned their 1% vs married their 1%? I am semi-successful professsionally from a meh-private college; my money comes from my husband’s family, not my career.

Both former low-income, heavily aided students who met at an ivy, went to med school at a different but top school, and earn top2%. Most of our adult friends are in medicine or law. About half came from no money and did not marry into significant (top-5%)money. We are younger than the ave college parents, just turned 50, college '97. Our friends are all similar. In fact the smartest two from '97 are a top lawyer and a research MD-phD.about 40% of my ivy was on need-based aid when I attended now it is 55%. parents on dcum who went to college in the 80s have a very different understanding of college compared to people from the late 90s. The legacy friends in my adult involved alum group are predominantly new to the top incomes, and were not legacies ourselves. My ivy absolutely changed my trajectory and it continues to do the same for a larger and larger portion of the undergraduate population.

This is a powerful defense of Ivies as institutions but it is hardly an argument that full-pay families not already in the top 1-2% should shell out an unlimited amount of money for these schools. The top 10-20% of American households is a pretty comfortable place to be, especially if you’re not hellbent on living in the center of an expensive city and you don’t saddle your kid with massive unnecessary debt. Obviously if you have functionally unlimited money, it doesn’t matter how you spend it. Good for Ivies, for redirecting a lot of that excess wealth to poor kids. But there’s absolutely no reason families in the 85th-95th percentile should voluntarily subject themselves to that tax.

Well said. We're at a private HS in CA and most of our class is in the top 1%. I've noticed for the truly wealthy, who come from generational wealth, they are less focused on ivies or Stanford because their kids will succeed in life regardless of where they go. Many of them are happy to ED at Middlebury and call it a day.

because they know their kids cannot get in. The uber wealthy who do get kids into ivies/stanford send them there. Sure they may care less but if they have the option they’ll pick the better school

Trust me that isn’t the reason. These kids are typically at the top but they don’t feel the need. Last year at our kids school the Val went to Williams and another top 10 kid went to Middlebury. Both were competitive for any of the Ivies but neither felt the need.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These articles focus on career “success” and not money “success”.

The insurance policy is that the graduates have rich friends and/or marry someone rich. How many parents on this board earned their 1% vs married their 1%? I am semi-successful professsionally from a meh-private college; my money comes from my husband’s family, not my career.

Sure if your only goal for your kids is that they enter the 1% and marry rich - you should sweat getting them into Princeton. I don’t think that is the only goal most parents have for their kids. Maybe I am wrong.

It isn’t marrying rich for me. It’s being around the right cohort. It matters in the long run.

If you want to make lifelong connections to the "right cohort" you should put energy in getting your kid into the "right" K-8 or K-12. The lifelong friendships are made then, and private school students at elite colleges often hang with other kids who went to similar private elementary/high schools. Elite college is cliquey but in kindergarten the kids are so young they don't care. That's been my experience having gone to private K-12 in NYC myself, putting my kids through that now, and having one at so-called "top 20" elite college now.

This 1000%. Have kids who attended public and one attended an elite private. My private school son is 22 and his best friends are still his prep school high school friends. They all went to top30 colleges but saw each other every break, every summer, etc. It's this high school community that he sees looking out for each other professionally in the top circles of IB, PE and business. They have yearly alum gatherings that trump anything I've seen at the collegiate level.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These articles focus on career “success” and not money “success”.

The insurance policy is that the graduates have rich friends and/or marry someone rich. How many parents on this board earned their 1% vs married their 1%? I am semi-successful professsionally from a meh-private college; my money comes from my husband’s family, not my career.

Sure if your only goal for your kids is that they enter the 1% and marry rich - you should sweat getting them into Princeton. I don’t think that is the only goal most parents have for their kids. Maybe I am wrong.

It isn’t marrying rich for me. It’s being around the right cohort. It matters in the long run.

If you want to make lifelong connections to the "right cohort" you should put energy in getting your kid into the "right" K-8 or K-12. The lifelong friendships are made then, and private school students at elite colleges often hang with other kids who went to similar private elementary/high schools. Elite college is cliquey but in kindergarten the kids are so young they don't care. That's been my experience having gone to private K-12 in NYC myself, putting my kids through that now, and having one at so-called "top 20" elite college now.

Meh. I know an NYC family in that supposedly “right cohort” and they are a complete disaster from top to bottom. The kids would have been much better off in every way going to a middle class public school somewhere on Long Island.

[Anonymous]

Has anyone read advanced copy of Selingo’s new book? If so, please share his list of 75 schools!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These articles focus on career “success” and not money “success”.

The insurance policy is that the graduates have rich friends and/or marry someone rich. How many parents on this board earned their 1% vs married their 1%? I am semi-successful professsionally from a meh-private college; my money comes from my husband’s family, not my career.

If the 1% make up a lot of the graduates, these kids are already in the 1%. They don’t need to go to college to make those friends. They already knew them in HS.

They no longer do, and the schools with the most are no longer the Ivy+.
The top 1% were about 17-18% of undergrads at ivy+ in an article using 2013 data! It was published in 2017 and again in 2021 but used data from the graduating class of 2013. The Ivys faced a lot of negative press from it and made changes, especially since 2020.

WashU, Colby, W&L, SMU had higher portions of undergrads in the top1% than ivys at the time: upwards of 24%. WashU is now much lower because they faced backlash in the round after the ivy backlash for the same thing. Pell grand, FGLI, %on need based aid, need-blind admissions are all pushed and broadcast loudly as goals by the top schools: WashU is right on the cusp of the T15ish group and has made, IMO, positive changes to prioritize socioeconomic equity in admissions.
Since the 2013 data, top colleges especially ivys have redoubled efforts to admit more pell grant kids, expand aid and promote equity. The ivys are MUCH LESS 1% (and less top 5%) heavy than they were 10 years ago yet still proportionally lead to higher likelihood of garnering jobs at MMB, top tech, or acceptance to top law, top med. Schools with the highest proportion of the 1% are not ivys and do not have results at the ivy level.

Hence outcomes these days are less about the proportion of 1% and more a factor of certain companies targeting top schools for efficiency purposes as well as the students of these top schools skew heavily toward the highest intelligence based on proportions: it is no surprise they have the highest LSAT and MCAT distributions. However a very top kid from a T50ish who had the stats and got admission or at least WL to a T15 can likely end up in a similar place, minus maybe a handful or two of companies that target name brands.

So the 1% are overrepresented. There are a lot more of them there than you would expect or find. But if the cohort is poorer and less connected, coupled with the less fun environment there's not much reason for the 1% to go to those schools. What's in it for them?

Idk about less fun, they certainly seem to have a lot of fun at my kid’s ivy. As a 2%er with a sibling in the 1%, we each have had kids pick ivy/t10 over the past five years: it is a great education and they study among the brightest peers of their age! Those who are there seek that. There may be fewer 1% kids and more pell grant/poor kids but it does not seem to be deterring the 1%ers who get in from going to these places.

Thing is they can get an equal peer group, an equal or superior education, and a greater percentage of 1% kids like them at a top SLAC so it just doesn’t matter to many of them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These articles focus on career “success” and not money “success”.

The insurance policy is that the graduates have rich friends and/or marry someone rich. How many parents on this board earned their 1% vs married their 1%? I am semi-successful professsionally from a meh-private college; my money comes from my husband’s family, not my career.

Both former low-income, heavily aided students who met at an ivy, went to med school at a different but top school, and earn top2%. Most of our adult friends are in medicine or law. About half came from no money and did not marry into significant (top-5%)money. We are younger than the ave college parents, just turned 50, college '97. Our friends are all similar. In fact the smartest two from '97 are a top lawyer and a research MD-phD.about 40% of my ivy was on need-based aid when I attended now it is 55%. parents on dcum who went to college in the 80s have a very different understanding of college compared to people from the late 90s. The legacy friends in my adult involved alum group are predominantly new to the top incomes, and were not legacies ourselves. My ivy absolutely changed my trajectory and it continues to do the same for a larger and larger portion of the undergraduate population.

People gravitate towards people like themselves.
I am going to take a guess that you didn't know anyone of generational wealth in college or grad school - because you don't know how to recognize it. While your ivy opened doors for your generation, the next generation will have a very hard time getting into an ivy because there is no pity party for children of ivy grads.
Many 1st gens that graduate into high salary figures think they have reached an UMC level of wealth but if it's not generational, the children will be wage slaves too trying to maintain the same lifestyle and similarly without any cushion.
Wealth has cushion, those kids can choose careers like art curator or non-profit work because they just need to get by. They don't need to save.

Nailed it.

We are not super wealthy but we have generational wealth (say $20-$25M NW and 1% salary). Kids are high achieving and will do well but there is a safety net for them that most just don’t have because they will never need to save for college expenses or housing down payments. Trusts will cover those things.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These articles focus on career “success” and not money “success”.

The insurance policy is that the graduates have rich friends and/or marry someone rich. How many parents on this board earned their 1% vs married their 1%? I am semi-successful professsionally from a meh-private college; my money comes from my husband’s family, not my career.

Both former low-income, heavily aided students who met at an ivy, went to med school at a different but top school, and earn top2%. Most of our adult friends are in medicine or law. About half came from no money and did not marry into significant (top-5%)money. We are younger than the ave college parents, just turned 50, college '97. Our friends are all similar. In fact the smartest two from '97 are a top lawyer and a research MD-phD.about 40% of my ivy was on need-based aid when I attended now it is 55%. parents on dcum who went to college in the 80s have a very different understanding of college compared to people from the late 90s. The legacy friends in my adult involved alum group are predominantly new to the top incomes, and were not legacies ourselves. My ivy absolutely changed my trajectory and it continues to do the same for a larger and larger portion of the undergraduate population.

People gravitate towards people like themselves.
I am going to take a guess that you didn't know anyone of generational wealth in college or grad school - because you don't know how to recognize it. While your ivy opened doors for your generation, the next generation will have a very hard time getting into an ivy because there is no pity party for children of ivy grads.
Many 1st gens that graduate into high salary figures think they have reached an UMC level of wealth but if it's not generational, the children will be wage slaves too trying to maintain the same lifestyle and similarly without any cushion.
Wealth has cushion, those kids can choose careers like art curator or non-profit work because they just need to get by. They don't need to save.

Nailed it.

We are not super wealthy but we have generational wealth (say $20-$25M NW and 1% salary). Kids are high achieving and will do well but there is a safety net for them that most just don’t have because they will never need to save for college expenses or housing down payments. Trusts will cover those things.

How is that generational wealth? imo generational wealth is over $50M NW.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These articles focus on career “success” and not money “success”.

The insurance policy is that the graduates have rich friends and/or marry someone rich. How many parents on this board earned their 1% vs married their 1%? I am semi-successful professsionally from a meh-private college; my money comes from my husband’s family, not my career.

Both former low-income, heavily aided students who met at an ivy, went to med school at a different but top school, and earn top2%. Most of our adult friends are in medicine or law. About half came from no money and did not marry into significant (top-5%)money. We are younger than the ave college parents, just turned 50, college '97. Our friends are all similar. In fact the smartest two from '97 are a top lawyer and a research MD-phD.about 40% of my ivy was on need-based aid when I attended now it is 55%. parents on dcum who went to college in the 80s have a very different understanding of college compared to people from the late 90s. The legacy friends in my adult involved alum group are predominantly new to the top incomes, and were not legacies ourselves. My ivy absolutely changed my trajectory and it continues to do the same for a larger and larger portion of the undergraduate population.

People gravitate towards people like themselves.
I am going to take a guess that you didn't know anyone of generational wealth in college or grad school - because you don't know how to recognize it. While your ivy opened doors for your generation, the next generation will have a very hard time getting into an ivy because there is no pity party for children of ivy grads.
Many 1st gens that graduate into high salary figures think they have reached an UMC level of wealth but if it's not generational, the children will be wage slaves too trying to maintain the same lifestyle and similarly without any cushion.
Wealth has cushion, those kids can choose careers like art curator or non-profit work because they just need to get by. They don't need to save.

Nailed it.

We are not super wealthy but we have generational wealth (say $20-$25M NW and 1% salary). Kids are high achieving and will do well but there is a safety net for them that most just don’t have because they will never need to save for college expenses or housing down payments. Trusts will cover those things.

Nailed what? Yes you are rich. No it is not necessary to have $20 mil to lead a good life. No, your money does not guarantee your children will be happy and productive, much less your grandchildren. Nor does it prove that a kid going to UVA will never get to the same level you are at.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:These articles focus on career “success” and not money “success”.

The insurance policy is that the graduates have rich friends and/or marry someone rich. How many parents on this board earned their 1% vs married their 1%? I am semi-successful professsionally from a meh-private college; my money comes from my husband’s family, not my career.

Both former low-income, heavily aided students who met at an ivy, went to med school at a different but top school, and earn top2%. Most of our adult friends are in medicine or law. About half came from no money and did not marry into significant (top-5%)money. We are younger than the ave college parents, just turned 50, college '97. Our friends are all similar. In fact the smartest two from '97 are a top lawyer and a research MD-phD.about 40% of my ivy was on need-based aid when I attended now it is 55%. parents on dcum who went to college in the 80s have a very different understanding of college compared to people from the late 90s. The legacy friends in my adult involved alum group are predominantly new to the top incomes, and were not legacies ourselves. My ivy absolutely changed my trajectory and it continues to do the same for a larger and larger portion of the undergraduate population.

People gravitate towards people like themselves.
I am going to take a guess that you didn't know anyone of generational wealth in college or grad school - because you don't know how to recognize it. While your ivy opened doors for your generation, the next generation will have a very hard time getting into an ivy because there is no pity party for children of ivy grads.
Many 1st gens that graduate into high salary figures think they have reached an UMC level of wealth but if it's not generational, the children will be wage slaves too trying to maintain the same lifestyle and similarly without any cushion.
Wealth has cushion, those kids can choose careers like art curator or non-profit work because they just need to get by. They don't need to save.

Nailed it.

We are not super wealthy but we have generational wealth (say $20-$25M NW and 1% salary). Kids are high achieving and will do well but there is a safety net for them that most just don’t have because they will never need to save for college expenses or housing down payments. Trusts will cover those things.

Nailed what? Yes you are rich. No it is not necessary to have $20 mil to lead a good life. No, your money does not guarantee your children will be happy and productive, much less your grandchildren. Nor does it prove that a kid going to UVA will never get to the same level you are at.

The PP nailed it. When the economic worries are not there different choices are available to kids going to school.