Even for the less-than-needy, the lure of a job in management consulting or investment banking can be hard to turn down.

Careers in business seem particularly hip and prestigious right now, especially as the rise of dot-coms and venture capital firms have brought a new sense of adventure and excitement.

"Let's face it," Wright-Swadel says. "Politics is not exactly what you'd call a glamour career. Harvard students are used to exploring career paths in which prestige is part of the outcome, and I'm not sure politics is seen as a prestigious environment right now."

Part of the distaste for political careers is no doubt related to the distaste for politics in general, but some say politics and government just don't offer appealing careers.

"The opportunity to have leadership over your own work exists more in the private sector. In a campaign, you begin as the bottom man on the totem pole," Mahoney says.

Besides, students--usually the ones taking the much-vilified two-year consulting and financial jobs--say the private sector offers students an ideal education for public life.

Some, like Shannon May '99-00, say that the financial training she will receive at Goldman, Sachs in New York will provide her with the training she needs to be a viable leader for a non-profit organization.

Others, like McLain, cite their movement to the business world as an opportunity to return to the regions in which they grew up--and possibly consider representing politically someday.