To Serve the World or the Bank Account?

Posted on June 6, 2008
Filed Under Column as I See 'Em, Media | By Jessica Gross

June: month of butterflies, barbeques, and guilt-infused debates about career choice. Should college grads’ decisions reflect a responsibility to the rest of the world? If so, which careers count as ethically responsible and which fall into the selfish bin? In a column in The Stanford Daily, Stuart Baimel argues that career choices are just a matter of personal preference and moralizing shouldn’t play a role.

Why? First, “a lot of the wealth of the rich gets redistributed downward” (our favorite Trickle-Down Theory). Second, people should have a right to the lifestyles they want - and besides, most public-service workers don’t like their dingy accommodations. Third, there’s always the life outside the job: being an i-banker doesn’t mean everything you do is self-oriented. And fourth, lots of high-income jobs are the most challenging and stimulating.

The process of choosing a career after school should be free of moralizing. Certainly, if one signs up to be a loanshark or mercenary, his moral standing is dubious. But for the vast majority of professions, it’s simply a matter of personal preference. No one (or at least, very few people) chooses to enter the corporate world purely out of passion for spreadsheets and conference calls. Instead, many simply have a different set of priorities than those entering the public service, and they shouldn’t be judged negatively for that.

So that is my message to the seniors, and to everyone: don’t feel guilty. Do what you want. Don’t look back.


I don’t know what to think. As a college senior, my thoughts were clear (and black-and-white): college grads who don’t go into public service are selfish. So I joined Teach For America. Then, when I hated teaching and realized I was bad at it, I got a job I actually liked. Since then my thoughts have been more muddled. Public service shouldn’t be completely out of the equation (how many i-bankers donate a good portion of their money to charity?). But I also have trouble defining what qualifies as “public service” in the first place. If you do Teach For America but you suck at it, are you serving the public any more than Trump? If you’re miserable and depressing to be with, does your negative effect on those around you take away from the good you’re doing? And who is “public service” supposed to serve? Do middle-class American kids count, or just residents of third-world countries?

Thoughts? Post ‘em in comments.

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One Response to “To Serve the World or the Bank Account?”

  1. “We came to Harvard to change the world, and we’re leaving to become investment bankers” : theprereq.com on June 23rd, 2008 11:16 am

    […] days, the cool thing to do when you graduate from college is to get paid tens of thousands at investment banks and consulting firms. But according to a New York Times article, some of the […]

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