11 Colleges With the Most Billionaire Alumni

Bob Haegele

August 11, 2021, 7:00 AM·4 min read

Obtaining a college degree has always been one of the best ways to increase your lifetime earnings. According to the Social Security Administration (SSA), men with college degrees earn $900,000 more in median lifetime income. Women with college degrees earn $630,000 more in median lifetime income.

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While those are impressive figures for the average person, they won’t make anyone a billionaire. But when it comes to rising to billionaire status, some colleges have a stronger track record than others. As you might expect, the colleges that produce the most billionaires are largely Ivy League universities.

But even for those who never reach 10 figures, Ivy League universities can still generate wealth. For instance, graduates from Ivy League universities have about double the salary of non-Ivy League graduates 10 years into their careers.

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By contrast, though, billionaires are in a league of their own. With 614 billionaires in the United States, having more than 10 billionaire graduates is a considerable feat. That is what we’ll walk through in this gallery, as the top 11 universities with the most billionaire graduates all have at least 10 of them.

Last updated: Aug. 10, 2021

9. (tie) Columbia University

Location: New York
Country: USA
# of Billionaire Alumni: 11
Total Net Worth of Billionaire Alumni: $40,900,000,000
Average Billionaire Alumni Net Worth: $3,718,181,818
Billionaire Alumni Example: Hedge fund managers Daniel Loeb and Noam Gottesman; New England Patriot's owner Robert Kraft

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9. (tie) University of California, Berkeley

Location: Berkeley, California
Country: USA
# of Billionaire Alumni: 11
Total Net Worth of Billionaire Alumni: $82,600,000,000
Average Billionaire Alumni Net Worth: $7,509,090,909
Billionaire Alumni Example: Intel co-founder Gordon Moore; Silicon Valley bankroller, Masayoshi Son

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9. (tie) Princeton University

Location: Princeton, New Jersey
Country: USA
# of Billionaire Alumni: 11
Total Net Worth of Billionaire Alumni: $288,400,000,000
Average Billionaire Alumni Net Worth: $26,218,181,818
Billionaire Alumni Example: Gap retail heirs, John, Robert and William Fisher; Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt

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8. Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Location: Cambridge, Massachusetts
Country: USA
# of Billionaire Alumni: 14
Total Net Worth of Billionaire Alumni: $104,000,000,000
Average Billionaire Alumni Net Worth: $7,428,571,428.57
Billionaire Alumni Example: Koch Industries CEO Charles Koch and brother William Koch; BeiGene CEO John Olyer

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7. University of Southern California

Location: Los Angeles
Country: USA
# of Billionaire Alumni: 15
Total Net Worth of Billionaire Alumni: $58,500,000,000
Average Billionaire Alumni Net Worth: $3,900,000,000.00
Billionaire Alumni Example: Koch Industries CEO Charles Koch and brother William Koch; BeiGene CEO John Olyer

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6. Cornell University

Location: Ithaca, New York
Country: USA
# of Billionaire Alumni: 18
Total Net Worth of Billionaire Alumni: $65,100,000,000
Average Billionaire Alumni Net Worth: $3,616,666,666.67
Billionaire Alumni Example: Former Citigroup head, Sandy Weill; David Dufield, software entrepreneur

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5. Mumbai University

Location: Mumbai
Country: India
# of Billionaire Alumni: 20
Total Net Worth of Billionaire Alumni: $162,800,000,000
Average Billionaire Alumni Net Worth: $8,140,000,000.00
Billionaire Alumni Example: Mukesh Ambani, Asia's richest person; Uday Kotak, founded one of India's largest banks in the private sector

4. Yale University

Location: New Haven, Connecticut
Country: USA
# of Billionaire Alumni: 21
Total Net Worth of Billionaire Alumni: $140,800,000,000
Average Billionaire Alumni Net Worth: $6,704,761,904.76
Billionaire Alumni Example: Candy heirs John, Valerie and Victoria Mars; Oil heirs Lee, Edward, Robert and Sid Bass; Brooklyn Nets owners Joe Tsai

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3. Stanford University

Location: Stanford, California
Country: USA
# of Billionaire Alumni: 28
Total Net Worth of Billionaire Alumni: $124,400,000,000
Average Billionaire Alumni Net Worth: $4,442,857,142.86
Billionaire Alumni Example: Vlad Tenev, Robinhood founder; Jerry Yang, Yahoo co-founder; David Velez, built digital bank Nubank

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2. University of Pennsylvania

Location: Philadelphia
Country: USA
# of Billionaire Alumni: 28
Total Net Worth of Billionaire Alumni: $284,800,000,000
Average Billionaire Alumni Net Worth: $10,171,428,571.43
Billionaire Alumni Example: Former U.S. President Donald J. Trump; Tesla CEO Elon Musk; Laurene Powell Jobs, Steve Jobs' daughter

DenisTangneyJr / Getty Images/iStockphoto

1. Harvard University

Location: Cambridge, Massachusetts
Country: USA
# of Billionaire Alumni: 29
Total Net Worth of Billionaire Alumni: $207,000,000,000
Average Billionaire Alumni Net Worth: $7,137,931,034.48
Billionaire Alumni Example: Former Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein; Los Angles Clippers owner Steve Ballmer; Brazilian investment banker Jorge Paulo Lemann

More From GOBankingRates

Methodology: For this piece GOBankingRates used Forbes 2021 Billionaire data to find the colleges with the most billionaire alumni. GOBankingRates found the 11 colleges with the most billionaire alumni while collecting the following data points: (1) name of college; (2) location of college; (3) country of college; (4) number of billionaire alumni, meaning had to graduate with a degree from said college; (5) total net worth of billionaire alumni; (6) average billionaire alumni net worth; and (7) some examples of the billionaire alumni from each college. All data was collected and is up to date as of July 26, 2021.

This article originally appeared on GOBankingRates.com: 11 Colleges With the Most Billionaire Alumni

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