About

About CareerReturns

We build institutional-grade financial tools to help professionals evaluate MBA programs and career investments the way capital allocators evaluate projects — with rigorous discounted cash flow analysis, not gut instinct.

Our Mission

An MBA from a top program costs $300,000–$400,000 when you factor in tuition, living expenses, and two years of foregone salary. Most prospective students make this decision based on prestige rankings, peer pressure, or vague career aspirations — not financial analysis.

CareerReturns exists to change that. We model the MBA as what it really is: a capital allocation decision. Every projection uses full discounted cash flow methodology — the same framework used by investment banks and private equity firms to evaluate multi-million dollar investments.

The Team

Himanshu Gauba

Founder, CareerReturns

Himanshu built CareerReturns after going through the MBA decision process himself and finding that the tools available — rankings sites, ROI calculators that ignored opportunity cost, generic salary surveys — were inadequate for a $300k capital decision. He applied institutional financial modeling principles (NPV, IRR, DCF) to the problem and built the platform he wished had existed.

The models are built on the same discounted cash flow framework used in corporate finance and investment banking. The salary and cost data is drawn from GMAC Graduate Management Admission Council surveys, Bloomberg Businessweek MBA rankings, US News program cost data, and publicly reported recruiter compensation figures.

Our Methodology

Every calculation on CareerReturns uses a full discounted cash flow (DCF) model with the following parameters:

Discount Rate

6.0%

Approximates the long-run risk-adjusted return on diversified equity investments. Reflects the opportunity cost of capital deployed toward an MBA.

Projection Horizon

10 Years

Post-graduation salary gains are modeled over 10 years. This is conservative — the career benefit of an MBA typically extends well beyond this window.

Loan Term

5 Years

Standard graduate loan repayment modeled using true monthly amortization with annuity-based repayment structures.

IRR Solver

Numerical

IRR is solved numerically via iterative algorithm (Newton-Raphson method) across the projected 10-year cash flow series.

Costs modeled include: tuition and program fees, two years of living expenses (estimated at $40k–$60k/year for US programs), and opportunity cost (foregone salary during the program). Post-MBA benefits modeled include: annual salary delta (post-MBA minus pre-MBA base), maintained across the projection horizon.

Data Sources

The salary and cost figures used across our guides are drawn from the following sources:

→GMAC (Graduate Management Admission Council) — Annual Corporate Recruiters Survey and Prospective Students Survey, which tracks pre-MBA salaries and post-MBA starting compensation by industry and region.
→Bloomberg Businessweek MBA Rankings — Program cost data, alumni salary outcomes, and recruiter demand scores by school.
→US News & World Report Best Business Schools — Tuition, enrollment, and program statistics for US MBA programs.
→Management Consulting and Investment Banking Recruiter Data — McKinsey, Bain, BCG, Goldman Sachs, and Morgan Stanley publicly reported associate compensation figures.
→Levels.fyi and Glassdoor — Technology sector post-MBA compensation including base, bonus, and equity components.

Important Limitations

CareerReturns provides financial modeling tools for informational purposes only. The models use published averages and benchmarks — individual outcomes will vary based on prior experience, school placement rates, personal negotiation, economic conditions at graduation, and many other factors.

This is not financial advice. The calculator is a framework for structured thinking — not a prediction. We recommend stress-testing multiple scenarios (optimistic, base, conservative) and consulting with a financial advisor before making any decision of this magnitude.

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Use our free MBA ROI calculator to model your specific scenario with NPV, IRR, and break-even analysis.

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Questions about our methodology or data?