3 Degrees You May Want to Consider Getting to Have a Career on Wall Street

When people hear or read about Wall Street, they usually think of men in business suits, walking around on the phone while clutching a briefcase in the other hand, seemingly in business talk. But Wall Street is so much more than the movie stereotypes.

Wall Street got its name from the early days of America. Dutch colonists built a wooden wall in lower Manhattan to protect themselves from forces of invasion. The walls have long gone, but the name has stuck ever since. Nowadays, Wall Street serves as the financial epicenter of New York. The New York Stock Exchange operates there, surrounded by a mass of big-name businesses and banks.

While some people might not be attracted to working in the finance and banking industry, a lot of people do have plans of working on Wall Street. Here are a few degrees you might want to consider if you want to work in these industries.

Finance

A Master’s degree in finance is one of the more straightforward ways to get a job on Wall Street. Because most positions on Wall Street have a lot to do with the management of money, getting a degree in finance is the best way to clinch the job you are looking for.

Because getting a job on Wall Street requires a well laid-out career plan, this often includes choosing the right courses and classes to take as early as college. Learning financial modeling for banking is important, and there are a lot of courses that can help with that. Interested candidates should also consider where they will be getting their degrees from. An Ivy League graduate will have a better chance of getting a job on Wall Street than those who did not get their finance degree from an Ivy League university.

Law

A less opted-for career path that some people choose to take to get on Wall Street is getting a degree in law. Some aspirants for the Chief Compliance Officer positions choose to take a degree in corporate law to help them prepare for the CCO role. Because a Chief Compliance Officer’s primary role is to make sure the company doesn’t get into any legal trouble, getting a law degree is very beneficial to clinching this particular role.

Having a Juris Doctor degree and getting a job at a law firm that handles corporate law cases is helpful to providing aspiring Wall Street workers the experience that they need to get a job at their dream banking institution.

Business Administration

Perhaps the most popular option for a lot of aspiring Wall Street employees is getting a higher education in business administration. According to CNBC News, getting a Master’s degree in business administration is a surefire way of getting a higher position in stock brokerage, investment banking, and other Wall Street business-related positions.

But it’s not just about getting the right degree. Oftentimes, where an applicant gets their degree from really plays a huge role in clinching a higher position. Most people in high positions on Wall Street often come from the same Ivy League schools, and have strong networks and connections with the alumni of their universities.