Do You Need an MBA If You Already Have a Good Network?

An MBA is one of the most career-aligned degrees on the market—everybody who’s enrolling is doing so with the hope of advancing their career. It’s also long been seen as the pathway to the C-suite; 46% of Fortune 1000 CEOs, CFOs, and top technology executives have an MBA. But have graduates been unlocking these opportunities via skills they build in the classroom or due to the network their degree program unlocks? The data shows us that access to a network is a major draw for prospective students. More than half of prospective MBA students cite network as a driving factor for pursuing a graduate business degree, and 76% of alumni agree that the degree helped them build a professional network.

Network and signaling have been enough to make an MBA an attractive pathway for decades, and the most selective programs are still cashing in on it. In 2025, applications grew at more than half of the most selective quartile of MBA programs globally. Less selective programs weren’t so lucky; nearly two-thirds reported declines, according to the same 2025 GMAC Application Trends Survey.

It’s impossible to fully parse how much network and signaling contribute to job outcomes compared to the skills graduates build in their MBA programs, and many programs are suffering because that distinction isn’t clear. Does this mean the MBA will die? Probably not. At top-tier schools, the network and signaling alone will still hold value. But other MBA programs will have to work harder to show their value, and discounting is not the solution. All schools could benefit from reworking their MBA programs to connect the alumni networking and experiential learning they provide more directly to the curriculum. This helps students understand—and prove—the tangible skills they earn by enrolling.

Pressures on the MBA

Four distinct factors are converging on the MBA to reshape both who wants the degree and the value it provides. Changes in financing options and international visa policies are making it harder for students to enroll, even if they’re interested in pursuing an MBA. Labor market pressures, including AI-driven “job hugging” and reductions in projected opportunities and salaries for graduates, are calling the value of the degree into question. Taken together, these factors are causing many students to think twice, even thrice, before enrolling in an MBA program.

Financing

No MBA is cheap, and most graduates take on some kind of debt to get their degree. The average MBA student graduates with $66,300 in student loan debt. While this is significantly less than the average debt a medicine or law student takes on, it’s $25,300 more than what they will be able to borrow over 2 years due to the new federal loan caps. The new caps limit borrowers to $20,500/year for an MBA, which does not cover the price of most MBAs. While other pathways are opening up, from increased scholarships at some institutions to private loan options, the lack of easy access to federal loans is causing students to question whether the MBA is worth it. Mid-tier and less selective MBA programs are feeling this the most because students are questioning whether those degrees will provide a valuable network and signaling compared to what they would get from an M7 or top-20 school.

International Visa Policies

MBA programs have, historically, been an attractive option for international students. International students typically make up 20–50% of a given U.S. MBA class, and international applicants account for roughly 40% of all MBA applications. However, new federal policies, including reducing visa terms for international students and making student visas harder to get, have driven a downward shift in the number of MBA applicants in recent years. Schools reporting year-over-year enrollment declines find those declines are heavily concentrated in international applicants; Carnegie Mellon’s Tepper School of Business’s international share fell from 53% to 37%, and Indiana University’s Kelley School of Business’s from 58% to 42%, between 2023 and 2025. This is a pressure that extends beyond MBAs; overall new international student enrollment at U.S. institutions is down approximately 17% from Fall 2024 to Fall 2025. Surprisingly, demand for MBAs internationally has grown—applications from India rose 26% and from East and Southeast Asia rose 42% in 2025, per the same GMAC survey—which points to how much these pressures are shaping international applicants’ decisions.

AI-Driven “Job Hugging”

MBA programs draw almost entirely from working adults; work experience is a requirement for many programs. Many adults pursuing an MBA are using it as a chance to explore a new career or jumpstart a career shift. But AI is reshaping how willing working adults are to take a chance on a new job or career. More than half of U.S. workers are staying in their current roles out of fear they won’t find another job—a phenomenon dubbed “job hugging.” The job hugging is not without reason, either; the JOLTS quits rate, the standard measure of worker mobility, has sat at or below 2% for close to a year and remains well below pre-pandemic norms. Job huggers are much less likely to take a chance on a career shift by enrolling in an MBA program when the outcomes are uncertain. This puts the burden on programs to prove they can deliver on outcomes.

The Job Opportunities Are Changing

An MBA used to be a strong path into a career in consulting. However, the pipeline for generalist MBAs is contracting. BCG canceled its full-time MBA recruiting cycles for two consecutive years. Bain paid incoming hires to delay their start date. Overall, 22 out of 24 MBA programs tracked by Poets and Quants, including the top 7 schools, saw consulting placement decline. Consulting recruiting continues to look different in 2026. BCG has announced it is actively limiting how many generalist MBAs it hires, and both BCG and McKinsey have added AI fluency as a core competency for MBA students.

Projected median starting salaries also dropped from $125,000 in 2025 to $120,000 this year. One in three corporate employers cites AI as a catalyst for changing hiring plans as some entry-level jobs have already been replaced by the technology. Older workers are also staying at their jobs for longer, reducing turnover that would normally open doors for new graduates. Even so, GMAC’s own data shows MBA graduates are still projected to outearn direct-from-industry hires by roughly $12,500 in median starting salary—a reminder that the degree’s ROI is compressing, not disappearing.

MBA Program Responses

These pressures have caused schools to split into two camps. Many mid-tier MBA programs are scrambling to respond by either cutting tuition, updating their programs, or offering large scholarships to entice students to apply. Purdue cut tuition by 40%. UC Irvine did nearly the same, presenting a Flex MBA program specifically cut to $99,000 to “fall under the graduate loan caps.” Of course, a student paying full tuition would still need to come up with $58,000 beyond the federal loans they take out given the program lasts 2 years and annual loans are capped at $20,500. While these discounts may make the programs more affordable, students will still have to expend tens of thousands of dollars a year or take on debt to complete their programs.

What’s interesting is that none of the top-20 programs have announced any significant changes. In fact, some, including Stanford GSB, Wharton, and Booth, have actually raised tuition. This is because these top-20 programs are still holding their value. While top-20 programs may still be able to get by on reputation alone, the vast majority of MBA programs do not have this luxury.

More than a Network and Internships

For programs outside the top 20, proving students actually build market-ready skills is nonnegotiable. That means showing that an MBA delivers tangible skills students can’t get from AI alone, paired with the network and internship access that’s always been the degree’s calling card. Programs are already starting to move here: 84% of business schools now report integrating AI into some part of the academic experience, up on every measured dimension from the year before. As with any other experiential learning component, internships are most effective when directly connected to the skills applicants are building.

AI-Proofing

Finance is one of the sectors most exposed to AI, particularly at the entry level. Brookings has found that roughly a third of workers in occupations like accounting and financial management may now be highly exposed to AI. Corporate leaders are reportedly exploring cuts to the entry-level analyst roles that have traditionally served as a foundation for career advancement.

AI is definitely disrupting the sector, but so far it’s causing disruption at the task level and mostly to lower-level tasks. Judgment, relationship-building, and knowing which of AI’s outputs to trust are still parts of the job that must be done by a human and ideally by a human who is familiar with AI, its outputs, and how to make these calls effectively in a business context. If MBA programs can position themselves as a training ground that vaults students past entry-level work into roles that demand critical thinking and active engagement with AI—judging its output and doing the work it can’t—they can offer exactly what job huggers are looking for: security in a changing economic landscape.

Where Programs Should Start

MBAs, especially those outside the top 20, will need to be rethought. The good news is that the answer is not simply slashing the price. In an economy where more than half of workers are too anxious to change jobs on their own, the program that can prove it de-risks a career leap, rather than simply enabling one, is the program that survives the shakeout. That’s a harder case to make than a tuition discount, but it’s the one that ensures the program provides meaningful skills to students in our rapidly changing job market.