For those going to College: Engineering, Computer-Science Pay More Than Liberal Arts

Wall Street Journal ^ | 10/25/2010 | Joe Light

[WebFocus]

The starting pay of certain liberal arts majors generally clocks in well below that of graduates in engineering fields, according to a Wall Street Journal study.

Graduates with engineering degrees earned average starting pay of $56,000 in their first full-time jobs out of college, topping other majors. Communications and English majors only earned $34,000 in their first jobs.

The survey, which was conducted by PayScale.com between April and June of this year, was answered by about 11,000 people who graduated between 1999 and 2010. The reported starting pay was adjusted for inflation to make the salaries of graduates from different years comparable.

The clear career path of engineering and computer science degrees means students often feel pressure to move into those fields, said Katharine Brooks, director of liberal arts career services at The University of Texas at Austin and author of "You Majored In What?

The pay advantage of graduates with technical degrees often persists throughout their careers, said Fort Collins, Colo.-based career counselor Katy Piotrowski. Although liberal arts majors have a wide range of salaries, Ms. Piotrowski said that mid-career liberal arts majors she works with in northern Colorado make between $60,000 and $70,000. Those with technical degrees make at least $10,000 more.

[WebFocus]

RE: And I know english majors manning the cash register during the summer at Disney.

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They’re probably earning money for their college expenses. That’s common for college students.

What interests me more is not what they do in Summer. I’d like to know what kind of careers they have AFTER Graduation.

If they’re still manning cash registers at Disney after getting their degree, then the $200,000 or so they paid in tuition plus board for 4 years in college would not really be a good Return on Investment.

[Borges]

How about good old fashioned C?

[SeekAndFind]

The article mentions a study made by PAYSCALE.

Well, it just so happened that PAYSCALE HAS A STUDY listing close to 900 colleges nationwide, determining which colleges on average provide the best ROI for the tuition that you pay after graduation.

See the list here :

http://www.payscale.com/education/average-cost-for-college-roi

TITLE : WHICH COLLEGES ARE WORTH YOUR INVESTMENT?

[McLynnan]

My daughter is in pharmacy school. In this part of the country starting pay is over $100K. I tell her I plan on retiring and moving in with her. You should see the look of horror on her face.

[Dick Vomer]

an RN can make that her first year....and pharmcists of cousre can make well over $80,000 a year. And $350,000 in debt. Plus interest.

I don't know what nursing school that is but I'd suggest looking around if the only nursing degree you can earn cost $350K

The Univ. of Texas has Texas residents will likely be charged $2,993 for tuition, $652 in University fees, and $306 in School of Nursing fees. Total = $3,951 for 12 hours of courses. This does not include books, supplies, etc.

[WayneS]

Well then I apologize for my misunderstanding.

[Pessimist]

I’m curious here.

What job would you seek with an Economics, Biology or Political Science degree?

[SVTCobra03]

“Most all professionals start with a liberal arts degree”

Every MD that I know has a pre-med or science undergrad. I know of no engineers, architects or accountants with a liberal arts undergrad degree.

[Texan Tory]

Civil Engineering is still engineering, so they must have separated it from the others because the pay disparity is so great. From what I’ve seen it always has a substantially lower starting salary than Electrical or Mechanical. You would think the market would sort it out over time so that the pay would be more similar.

[Pessimist]

“at the technology they SPECIFICALLY WANT”

I’m in the same business as you, and I agree with your assesment.

It’s understandable, but sometimes it’s taken to pretty ridiculous extremes. Our thinking here is that if you find a good, hard core, C/C+_+ guy, he can pretty much learn all the situation specific stuff on the job.

Those are not all that easy to find though. Most “kids” nowadays tend toward high level development.

[WebFocus]

RE: How about good old fashioned C?

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Not good enough anymore I’m afraid. You don’t see advertisements that say C programming at all. Everything is Object-Oriented programming now. So C is old skills. The skills they want is C++.

And note, not just knowledge of C++, a lot of the ads I see want such esoteric knowledge as -— experience with the Boost Libraries or Sockets/Network programming skills.

Such skills are hard to find, but they pay a premium. That’s why it’s also getting hard to be a tech recruiter these days. Although there is demand for such skills, you just can’t find that special someone out there who isn’t already taken.

I personally believe that anyone with a good tech background and good programming skills can LEARN these technologies reasonably quickly. Just a buy a good book and learn it.

PROBLEM : Companies want those skills NOW and don’t want to spend money waiting for you to get up to speed on it. There used to be a time when companies would allow you to learn on the job... those places seem to be getting scarce.

[devere]

My son, a very personable young man of 21, has recently earned a BS in Mechanical Engineering, and passed his state exam.

Can anyone here help him get a job interview?

At present it seems that there are no entry level mechanical engineering jobs at any salary level (not even volunteer work paying zero$!).

[mikey_hates_everything]

Where’s Womens Studies on that list? I guess living in a dumpster doesn’t count as salary. And that’s during good times.

[WebFocus]

RE: The Univ. of Texas has Texas residents will likely be charged $2,993 for tuition, $652 in University fees, and $306 in School of Nursing fees. Total = $3,951 for 12 hours of courses. This does not include books, supplies, etc.

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Those are very reasonable rates. But then you have to be a Texas resident to receive such generous tuition.

[WebFocus]

RE: What job would you seek with an Economics, Biology or Political Science degree?

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I know a few recent Economics majors from Grove City College who were employed by banks and financial institutions ( one I know is doing macro economic analysis for Morgan Stanley ).

I know of a Biology major who went to Medical School and another who went to grad school and eventually got hired by a biotech/pharma company.

I don’t know any Poli Sci grad so can’t really tell you.

[wku man]

I don't know about all that, but Hannity did it the hard way, to be sure. However, there's an element of luck and timing involved with any talk host's success. After all, there are local hosts across the country that are just as good, if not better than Hannity, Beck, Savage, et al. But for one reason or another, most likely because of market saturation, they haven't caught the lucky break they need to make the jump from local talk to syndication.

Scouts Out! Cavalry Ho!

[SeeSac]

Most all professionals start with a liberal arts degree.

Engineers and Scientists are professionals but do not start with liberal arts degrees.

[SeeSac]

Whwen I was in undergrad “everyone” was Pre-med.

Not really.

[Pessimist]

I can see the biology major getting employed after post grad education.

I woulda thunk the banking stuff would have been finance people though rather than economics.

[Pessimist]

FWIW, Firmware is still overwhelmingly C. So are device drivers (perhaps a little less so though).