Anonymous wrote:You go get a jd when you want to be a lawyer. A jd does nothing really when interviewing for a finance job. It's just another letter after your name and may even make you look unfocused. It's not even like your son can fall back on a legal job if finance does not work out as most of big law do their hiring in year three of law school. Waste of time and money. Do finance or do law. Start an analyst job in finance and then go to the best school possible for mba

This is soooo wrong. Finance is so complicated that a law degree is valued. It helped my tremendously. I was much more competitive. The bank wanted me because of the complexity of the deals.

Anonymous wrote:Agree with PP. I would advise your son to graduate the year early and look for a job that would get him on the path toward the business career he thinks he wants. Then after a couple of years, he should choose either to do the MBA or to switch to law.

I COULD NOT DISAGREE MORE!! I don't have a jd mba, but a jd mpp. The MPP is in policy, but from very quantitative program. I did practice law, but then went to an investment bank. I was in capital markets structured finance. I got the job because because of the law degree and master's degree. The business side completely appreciates a law degree. You make just as much money. If your kid is interested in wall street or big law, it's a great option. It's an even better option if your kid doesn't want to stay in law forever.

You go get a jd when you want to be a lawyer. A jd does nothing really when interviewing for a finance job. It's just another letter after your name and may even make you look unfocused. It's not even like your son can fall back on a legal job if finance does not work out as most of big law do their hiring in year three of law school. Waste of time and money. Do finance or do law. Start an analyst job in finance and then go to the best school possible for mba

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:None of the people I know with JD/MBAs use the MBA portion. It's just a way for the schools to charge more money.

That's because you live in DC (i assume).

mittens the shittens - jd/mba, baker scholar, i don't think he ever used the jd in his life.

Actually I know a few jd/mba's from H and Northwestern and none of them practice. They all went into buyside finance (PE or VC).

I know a jd/mba who is a current H student that interned last summer at McKinsey. He's going to do a law firm this summer, but I think his ideal exit goal after graduation is PE.

Why the need for the weird partisan dig? Odd.

Where is he going to school? What have his internships been to date?

I am involved with recruiting at my firm and not only do top talent have great grade, they are getting experiences.

There are also some great mentorship programs your son should search out to get advice from local alum or professionals who are interested in helping students. Hearing it from them will probably sink in a little more than coming from mom.

Good luck!

Lawyer here who has done big firm and also in-house.
He should get the work experience for 3 years and then do a top 10 MBA program. If he still wants the JD, he can get it then. (I think you can get a JD/MBA at Darden (UVA), Fuqua (Duke), UNC---not sure re Wharton and I don't think you can at Harvard).

My observation from the legal side is that the JD doesn't really help that much in a business career unless he actually spends a couple of years working in a very large NYC law firm doing private equity/venture capital work. You just don't learn enough practical career skills in law school to have it make a difference. It would just be another notch on the belt.

Anonymous wrote:None of the people I know with JD/MBAs use the MBA portion. It's just a way for the schools to charge more money.

Very true. And the "name" of the law school is far more important than any joint program today. Unless you are going to a very top tier law school, don't bother. The market is still that bad.

If he wants finance ....get the MBA from a good school (e.g., Wharton etc.). Forget about the JD its not necessary and really adds nothing but a few letters after his name....

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The JS/MBAs I know live in NYC and work in Finance. Should your son go that route, he will likely be very well paid (high six figures into the millions).

OP here. Yes, this is his interest.

Yes, I'm originally from a close suburb of NYC and many of the people in my town had JD/MBA and work in finance or consulting.

Hey OP, I worked as a financial analyst. One thing I'd tell your DS is that he should get as much experience as possible with MS Excel and Access and maybe take a class in SQL (standard Query Language) if it's offered. IME being able to access and manipulate data and create reports on the fly was crucial

OP here- thank you so very much I will forward your suggestions to him. You never know what will sink in/help with a 20 year old. He is looking for internship opportunities as his next step.

If he wants to work in finance, he is better off trying to get into one of the finance analyst classes and get his finance career kick started. Noone will care about his JD degree. He'll actually earn decent money and then use it to fund MBA school where he can better appreciate it and use the time to shift careers if needed. A senior MD told me once..MBA is like a career do over if your first choice career does not work out. So no, JD/MBA is a waste of time for finance now. He needs to work his ass off to get a finance internship that leads to a finance job, hopefully at an elite investment bank or finance firm.

When I was in B-school there were a few doing both. All went into finance. I remember that one went into it straight out of undergrad and had a hard time convincing the b school to take him.

Seems like an awful lot of hard work and debt for not much more payoff than a straight mba. That said, the people who do it seem to be whip smart and hard workers so if I were hiring, I would pick them over others in a heartbeat.

I can only speak to this as a lawyer - but I think that, if he wants to work in finance, he may not need the law degree? Finance folks, what do you think?

While he's in school now, it sounds like he has the finance/econ angle covered, but if he wants to do well in law school, he should take courses that require him to write.

You don't need to write well to get into law school, but you sure have to write well to do well there.