B******* Students

An article in the November 27 issue of Forbes magazine (you have to pay for it, don't bother) identifies a smart way to predict which industries are heading for a fall, namely, those most keenly sought after by business school graduates. Author Chana R. Schoenberger explains:

In 2000, 17 percent of grads of the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School took Silicon Valley jobs, only to see technology collapse soon after. In 2001, 30 percent of Wharton job-seekers, more than ever before, took investment banking jobs. Wall Street laid off tens of thousands of bankers over the next two years.

The article continues:

"There's a disconnect a lot of times between what M.B.A.s want to do and where the jobs are," concedes Janet Raiffa, head of U.S. campus recruiting for Goldman Sachs. Goldman has plenty of openings for investment bankers and private-wealth managers this year, but the hot areas for M.B.A. applicants are merchant banking (making investments with a firm's own money) and trading.

You have been warned. Although if Schoenberger is a business school graduate, there is of course the possibility that this trend is itself two years out of date.