Holiday

I come from a finance background and I got into SAIS with a 12k/year scholarship. I also got into the other main IR programs and got a significant scholarship from one of them, zilch from the other two. I decided not to pursue an MBA because it didn't really fit my academic interests, and it was the cheaper option. However, many of the international development jobs I want prefer to hire MBAs. The sad truth is that IR schools are a bad investment for almost everyone. Paying 6 figures and not working for two years to graduate with a $50-80k salary is very hard to justify. I am doing this because I want to pivot to a career that I find rewarding and to learn about the subjects I find interesting. That to me is worth the investment, but I can also afford to pay for school without taking on debt, which was a big part of my decision.

Nebula, I would encourage you to hone in on your specific interests within international finance as it's a broad field and doing so will help you make your decision. If youre interested in international development finance, SAIS is the better program in terms of job prospects from what I gather. If you're interested in more traditional finance careers, SIPA might be a better choice for you. SAIS also places well within mgmt consulting relatively (although not on par with mba programs). Overall, my impression is that career prospects are generally stronger out of SAIS (their placement statistics confirms this) but SIPA has a stronger network within NY firms obviously. if you don't have finance experience, a worthwhile MBA is not really an option and I think an IR school could potentially give your the experience to break into the field but it will definitely be challenging. You might want to try to get some finance experience before grad school as it would help your chances and give u a better idea of what you might want to do.