• Wharton has introduced a new concentration for undergrads and a major for MBA students focused on AI.
• The new AI curriculum includes classes on machine learning, ethics, data mining, and neuroscience.
• "Companies are struggling to recruit talent with the necessary AI skill," Wharton's vice dean said.

The nation's oldest business school is evolving for the new, AI-powered world.

The University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School has unveiled a new MBA major and undergraduate concentration in artificial intelligence. It will be available to students in the fall of 2025 as one of 21 MBA majors alongside options like accounting, finance, marketing, and real estate. For undergraduates who earn a degree in economics, it'll be one of 19 concentrations.

The new curriculum will help students develop both a technical understanding of how businesses are using AI and a more conceptual sense of the technology's economic, social, and ethical implications. Students will be required to take classes in machine learning and ethics and choose from a list of electives spanning data mining to marketing to neuroscience.

One of the required courses will be "Big Data, Big Responsibilities: Toward Accountable Artificial Intelligence," an ethics class.

"Foundations of Deep Learning" will be a new class in the statistics and data science department, giving students an introduction to the technical foundations of AI, Wharton professor Giles Hooker, an advisor for the new AI curriculum, told Business Insider by email. It will cover the technology underpinning the AI boom, including topics from "what is a neural network and how to train it" to "generative AI" to "efficient deep learning" to ensure students have "a solid conceptual grasp on what goes on under the hood in modern AI models," according to the syllabus.

Wharton also updated the syllabi for existing classes, including the management course "Innovation, Change, and Entrepreneurship" and the marketing course "Introduction to Brain Science for Business."

In a university press release announcing the changes, Eric Bradlow, the vice dean of AI and Analytics at Wharton, said, "We are at a critical turning point where practical AI knowledge is urgently needed."

"Companies are struggling to recruit talent with the necessary AI skills, students are eager to deepen their understanding of the subject and gain hands-on experience, and our faculty's expertise on the adoption and human impact of AI is unmatched," he said.

The intersection of AI and business

Wharton faculty began discussing a new AI curriculum last year, Hooker told BI.

In May 2024, Wharton launched the AI and Analytics Initiative to study possible changes to its curriculum, invest in new research, collaborate more with industries, and create open-source generative AI resources, according to Penn Today, the university's official news site.

Through the initiative, Wharton has launched the AI Research Fund to help faculty pursue research at the intersection of AI and business and the Education Innovation Fund to help faculty adopt AI in the classroom.

The initiative was also used to provide ChatGPT Enterprise licenses to all full-time and executive MBA students starting in the fall of 2024 — a first-of-its-kind collaboration between a business school and OpenAI.

In January, Wharton unveiled the Accountable AI Lab, which will produce research on AI governance, regulation, and ethics with a "practical focus on business applications."

Wharton therefore had several building blocks in place for a new curriculum, Hooker told BI. "A lot of what we had to do was to work out how to structure a useful and coherent path through what we offered and then see if there was anything we really needed to add," he said.

Students who graduate with an AI focus will ideally be adept in four areas, Hooker said. They'll have a strong technical knowledge of AI to assess the design and application of AI models in a business and be informed enough to keep up with new AI developments. They'll have a sense of how AI will impact business operations. They'll also have a handle on the ethics of data and automated decision-making and understand the legal frameworks governing AI.

Companies these days are hiring candidates who specialize in just one of these areas. For example, a company might hire an AI researcher to train large language models, a learning and development expert to teach teams how to use the technology or a lawyer who understands data privacy and regulations.

But graduates of Wharton's new program may emerge as a jack-of-all-AI-trades. Their skill sets will be tailored to a future workplace where adaptability might be more valuable than specialization.

"We expect the impact of AI on business to be long and deep. Even without new breakthroughs in human-like reasoning, we can expect AI methods to penetrate even further into business processes and our lives," Hooker said. "The careers and job titles associated with its penetration into business haven't yet been fixed."

Robotics firm iRobot, originator of the robotic vacuum Roomba facing stiff competition from lower-priced competitors, told investors Tuesday that there was "substantial doubt" about the company's survival "as a going concern" in the next year or so.

Investors took iRobot at its word, and its stock price had fallen nearly 40 percent as of 10:20 am Wednesday from the day before. The dire accounting language and market reaction are nothing new for tech firms, but iRobot's annual report suggests deeper issues than investor confidence. The company saw revenue drop 47 percent in the fourth quarter, it is actively seeking to renegotiate its largest loans, and it has launched a "formal strategic review" to consider refinancing, sale, or other alternatives.

The shaky world of consumer robotics

iRobot's fortunes have changed dramatically since 2022, when Amazon announced a $1.7 billion bid to buy the struggling but prominent firm.

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• Recent MBA graduates are having a harder time finding jobs than a couple of years ago.
• A white-collar hiring slowdown has impacted MBA graduates at schools like Harvard, Yale, and Stanford.
• We asked economists whether the hiring landscape could improve in the years to come.

The white-collar job market has gotten so competitive, that even MBA graduates — once thought of as having a leg up in hiring — are struggling to land jobs. Their troubles could stick around for a while.

Since July, Joshua has worked at Starbucks while he looks for a marketing job. In the fall of 2023, his contract position at PlayStation was cut and, despite working with a recruiting agency, he still hasn't landed a job in his chosen industry.

"I'm an MBA graduate in his 30s, living paycheck to paycheck, watching what feels like the rest of my colleagues and classmates move forward with their lives," said Joshua, who earned his business degree from Santa Clara University in 2021. His last name is known to BI but is being withheld due to fear of professional repercussions.

Job acceptance rates at some of the top business schools have declined in recent years. Much of it likely has to do with a slowdown in white-collar hiring overall, but other evidence suggests companies are hiring fewer MBAs. After all, they may require a higher salary than their peers at a time when companies are pivoting to invest in technology that promises to do the job cheaper than any human — no matter their degree level.

MBA graduates' job-acceptance rates are down in a slowing job market

Business Insider looked at the job acceptance rates three months post-graduation at the top 15 business schools from US News and World Report's 2024 ranking — and focused on the nine MBA programs with publicly available data going back eight years and Harvard, with data going back six years.

At eight of the 10 schools, the class of 2024's job acceptance rate was the lowest.

Economists told BI that elevated interest rates and companies' investments in artificial intelligence are among the factors that have led to slower hiring for MBA graduates.

Gracy Sarkissian, associate dean of Columbia University's career management center, said that while the three-month post-graduation job acceptance rate for the school's MBA graduates fell in 2023, employment reached pre-pandemic levels by the end of the year.

Dartmouth, Yale, Stanford, MIT, Dartmouth, the University of Michigan, the University of Pennsylvania, and the University of Virginia didn't respond to requests for comment. Duke and Harvard declined to comment.

The usual suspects for MBA hiring — consulting firms and Big Tech — are hiring fewer of them, the Wall Street Journal reported in January.

It's all part of an overall hiring slowdown. US businesses are hiring at nearly the lowest rate since 2013, per Bureau of Labor Statistics data.

While the overall US unemployment rate remains low compared to historical levels, many people who need a job are dealing with a considerably tougher market than a few years ago.

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Higher interest rates and economic uncertainty have slowed hiring for white-collar roles

Elevated interest rates have contributed to slower hiring in industries such as finance, tech, and consulting — sectors that attract many MBA grads, Kory Kantenga, head of economics, Americas at LinkedIn, told BI. Instead, healthcare, government, and hospitality have been dominating hiring since 2023.

In addition to higher interest rates, uncertainty about Trump administration policies and the impacts of AI have led some businesses to be more cautious about expanding their workforces, said Audrey Guo, an assistant professor of economics at Santa Clara University. She added tech companies that hired workers in droves during the pandemic — only to lay off many workers in recent years — may be looking to avoid this cycle in the current climate.

Allison Shrivastava, an economist with the Indeed Hiring Lab, said some companies could be slowing hiring because they're waiting to see if the economy can stick a "soft landing" — in which inflation comes down, the unemployment rate doesn't spike, and a recession is avoided. She said job openings for finance and tech roles on Indeed have fallen considerably from their peaks in 2022, to below levels seen in February 2020.

"If I were looking for a job in banking and finance or software development, I would expect it to definitely take longer than it did in 2022," Shrivastava said.

Finding work can be challenging even in sectors with more job openings. This includes management roles, where openings listed on Indeed are roughly 9% higher than they were in February 2020.

Dan Trujillo is trying to find one of those management roles. He was laid off in January from his role as a director of customer experience at a manufacturing company. He earned his Executive MBA from the University of Colorado a year earlier and said he struggled to land his previous job. "I applied to somewhere between 25 and 30 positions without ever hearing anything back other than a rejection email," said Trujillo, who's in his mid-40s and based in the Denver area.

Guo said some employers could be slowing hiring as they monitor the potential of AI tools in the workplace. Additionally, some companies' significant investments in AI could also be leaving them with less money to put toward hiring workers.

"I think the roles where we're seeing the biggest declines in demand now tend to be the ones that have really high returns to using AI," said Lisa Simon, chief economist at the workforce analytics company Revelio Labs. She cited software engineers and data analysts as two examples.

Rate cuts and an uptick in retirements could help job seekers

Looking ahead, Kantenga said that future Federal Reserve interest rate cuts could help improve labor market conditions for MBA graduates. CME FedWatch, which projects interest-rate changes based on market activity, forecasts a nearly 84% chance rates will be lower by the end of the year. However, Kantenga said uncertainties tied to the Trump administration could lead some employers to slow hiring until they have a clearer sense of what policies will be implemented.

Additionally, some changes to the current labor market could work in the favor of MBA graduates. Satyam Panday, chief US and Canada economist at S&P Global Ratings, said that an uptick in baby boomer retirements in the coming years could create a gap in the workforce that AI likely won't be able to fill — which could make it easier for some MBA graduates to find work. While some companies may be able to get by with fewer workers, Guo said they'll still need to invest in their leaders of the future.

"Companies will need to think about how to still preserve a pipeline of new workers so that, eventually, when the senior people retire or need to be replaced, there still is some pipeline of people with that experience," she said.

• The "Big Four" accounting firms employ about 1.5 million people worldwide. 
• Many of these employees make six-figure salaries and are eligible for annual bonuses.  
• Business Insider analyzed data to determine how much employees are paid at these firms. 

The so called "Big Four" accounting firms — Deloitte, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), KPMG, and Ernst & Young (EY) — are known for paying their staff high salaries. 

An entry-level consultant who just graduated from business school can make over $200,000 a year at the four firms when you include base salary, bonuses, and relocation expenses. 

Several of these firms have faced layoffs and implemented hiring freezes over the past year as demand for consulting services has waned. Still, they're a good bet for anyone looking to land a six-figure job straight out of school. 

Business Insider analyzed the US Office of Foreign Labor Certification's 2023 disclosure data for permanent and temporary foreign workers to find out what PwC, KPMG, EY, and Deloitte paid US-based employees for jobs ranging from entry-level to executive roles. We looked through entries specifically for roles related to management consulting and accounting. This data does not reflect performance bonuses, signing bonuses, and compensation other than base salaries.

Here's how much Deloitte, PwC, KPMG, and EY paid their hires.  

Deloitte paid senior managers between $91,603 to $288,000

With 457,000 employees worldwide, Deloitte employs the most people of any of the 'Big Four.' It pulled in close to $64.9 billion in revenue for the 2023 fiscal year, marking a 9.4% increase from 2022.

Deloitte did not immediately respond to a request for comment on its salary data or 2024 hiring plans.

Here are the salary ranges for consulting and accounting roles: 

• Analyst: $49,219 to $337,500 (includes advisory, business, project delivery, management, and systems)
• Senior business analyst: $97,739 
• Audit and assurance senior assistant: average $58,895
• Consultant: $54,475 to $125,000 (includes advisory, technology strategy, and strategic services)  
• Global business process lead: $180,000 
• Senior consultant: average $122,211
• Manager: average $152,971
• Tax manager: average $117,268
• Senior manager: $91,603 to $288,000  
• Managing director: average $326,769
• Tax managing director: average $248,581
• Principal: $225,000 to $875,000

Principals at PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) can make well over $1 million.

PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) is a global professional services firm with over 370,000 employees worldwide. The firm reported a revenue of more than $53 billion for the 2023 fiscal year, marking a 5.6% increase from 2022. 

PwC did not immediately respond to a request for comment on its salary data or 2024 hiring plans.

Here are the salary ranges for both consulting and accounting roles. 

• Associate: $68,000 to $145,200
• Senior associate: $72,000 to $197,000 
• Manager: $114,300 to $231,000
• Senior manager: $142,000 to $251,000 
• Director: $165,000 to $400,000  
• Managing director: $260,000 to $330,600
• Principal: $1,081,182 to $1,376,196

KPMG offers managing directors anywhere between $230,000 to $485,000

KPMG has over 273,000 employees worldwide. The firm reported a revenue of $36 billion for the 2023 fiscal year, marking a 5% increase from 2022. 

KPMG did not immediately respond to a request for comment on its salary data or 2024 hiring plans.

Here are the salary ranges for consultants, accountants, and leadership at KPMG. 

• Associate: $61,000 to $140,000
• Senior associate: $66,248 to $215,000
• Director: $155,600 to $260,000
• Associate director: $155,700 to $196,600 
• Specialist director: $174,000 to $225,000
• Lead specialist: $140,500 to $200,000
• Senior specialist: $134,000 to $155,000
• Manager: $99,445 to $293,800
• Senior manager: $110,677 to $332,800
• Managing director: $230,000 to $485,000

Statisticians at Ernst & Young (EY) make salaries ranging between $66,000 to $283,500.

EY employs close to 400,000 people worldwide. For the 2023 fiscal year, the firm reported a record revenue of $49.4 billion, marking a 9.3% jump from 2022. 

The firm did not immediately respond to a request for comment on its salary data or 2024 hiring plans.

Here are the salary ranges for consultants, accountants, auditors, and chief executives at the firm: 

• Accountants and auditors: $54,000 to $390,000
• Appraisers and assessors of real estate: $166,626 to $185,444
• Computer systems analyst: $62,000 to $367,510
• Management analyst: $49,220 to $337,500
• Statistician: $66,000 to $283,500
• Financial risk specialist: $62,000 to $342,400
• Actuaries: $84,800 to $291,459
• Economist: $77,000 to $141,000
• Logisticians: $72,000 t0 $275,000
• Mathematicians: $165,136 to $377,000
• Computer and information systems manager: $136,167 to $600,000
• Financial manager: average $320,000

Aman Kidwai and Weng Cheong contributed to an earlier version of this post.