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Megan McArdle

Megan McArdle - Megan McArdle is a senior editor for The Atlantic who writes about business and economics. She has worked at three start-ups, a consulting firm, an investment bank, a disaster recovery firm at Ground Zero, and The Economist. More

Megan was born and raised on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, and yes, she does enjoy her lattes, as well as the occasional extra-dry skim-milk cappuccino. Her checkered work history includes three start-ups, four years as a technology project manager for a boutique consulting firm, a summer as an associate at an investment bank, and a year spent as sort of an executive copy girl for one of the disaster-recovery firms at Ground Zero … all before the age of 30.

While working at Ground Zero, Megan started Live From the WTC, a blog focused on economics, business, and cooking. She may or may not have been the first major economics blogger, depending on whether we are allowed to throw outlying variables such as Brad Delong out of the set. From there it was but a few steps down the slippery slope to freelance journalism. She has worked in various capacities for The Economist, where she wrote about economics and oversaw the founding of Free Exchange, the magazine's economics blog. She has also maintained her own blog, Asymmetrical Information, which moved to The Atlantic, along with its owner, in August 2007.

Megan holds a bachelor's degree in English literature from the University of Pennsylvania and an M.B.A. from the University of Chicago. After a lifetime as a New Yorker, she now resides in northwest Washington, D.C., where she is still trying to figure out what one does with an apartment larger than 400 square feet.

Bank of America unhires foreign MBAs

By Megan McArdle
Mar 9 2009, 12:25 PM ET Comment

Apparently Congress' "buy American" clause in the bailout funds is having its desired effect:  Bank of America has rescinded its job offers to foreign MBAs.  I suspect that Bank of America is at least as motivated by a need to reduce headcount as it is by fear of Congress.  But cutting your recruitment based on country of origin, rather than skills and fit, does not seem like the most efficient way to do it.

As a committed free trader--and an MBA who went through the mass layoffs of the last recession--my sympathy is all with the MBAs.  These are people who mostly aren't eligible for scholarships or subsidized student loans; they've borrowed or spent close to $100,000 in America to get their degree, many of them in hopes of staying here.  They're intelligent, highly skilled, and promise to be net contributors to the tax system . . . so America kicks them in the teeth and sends them home without a job.


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