16 highest-paying college majors, 5 years after graduation

[Anonymous]

This is five years after graduation. Further out it is the doctors who are making bank.

https://www.bls.gov/ooh/highest-paying.htm

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sounds depressing. I was an art major and made $80k right after graduation. That was in 2002s dollars

You don't understand statistics, but then, you're an art major.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is five years after graduation. Further out it is the doctors who are making bank.

https://www.bls.gov/ooh/highest-paying.htm

Doctors (and lawyers) need more advanced education, which means spending more money on education in order to make those big bucks.

Engineers don't need to do that in order to make big bucks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sounds depressing. I was an art major and made $80k right after graduation. That was in 2002s dollars

What kind of work did you do as an art major?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:When I graduated as a mechanical engineer 25 years ago, my starting salary was $58,000.

It's definitely strange that college graduate are not making much more a quarter century later. What's going on?

Even if you are making more, the increase cost of living would kill any gains. Actually, I believe we are worse off now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sounds depressing. I was an art major and made $80k right after graduation. That was in 2002s dollars

You don't understand statistics, but then, you're an art major.

I'm work in statistics and I think PP does understand: you can't predict a single outcome from averages across such a broad category--especially one that does zero modeling of predictive factors and ignores important variabilities across institutions and important factors across time periods (e.g., what is the lifetime ROI). A better way to draw insight is that for any given person the profession that they are most likely to earn well in is the one where their skills and interests are the highest and that overlaps with an area that society is willing to pay. That is where an individual is likely to find their highest salary in an evolving career that will sustain over their lifetime. Much more sensible to introspect on that on some dumb averages about salary at 5 years that strips away all the predictive factors that will shape your individual outcome.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:When I graduated as a mechanical engineer 25 years ago, my starting salary was $58,000.

It's definitely strange that college graduate are not making much more a quarter century later. What's going on?

Many times they lump a bunch of people into these engineering categories. As an example, many semiconductor and manufacturing companies hire 2-year Associates Degree "engineers". These folks probably went to community college or even went the apprentice route. It is an efficient way to have a career that may top out at $100k, which is a very nice living for many people.

I would not be surprised if there are many examples of those types also included in the statistics.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sounds depressing. I was an art major and made $80k right after graduation. That was in 2002s dollars

You don't understand statistics, but then, you're an art major.

I'm work in statistics and I think PP does understand: you can't predict a single outcome from averages across such a broad category--especially one that does zero modeling of predictive factors and ignores important variabilities across institutions and important factors across time periods (e.g., what is the lifetime ROI). A better way to draw insight is that for any given person the profession that they are most likely to earn well in is the one where their skills and interests are the highest and that overlaps with an area that society is willing to pay. That is where an individual is likely to find their highest salary in an evolving career that will sustain over their lifetime. Much more sensible to introspect on that on some dumb averages about salary at 5 years that strips away all the predictive factors that will shape your individual outcome.

Nope. Majors and 5 year out is still a good reference assuming everything else is equal.

You can also look into 10 year 20 year or life time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is five years after graduation. Further out it is the doctors who are making bank.

https://www.bls.gov/ooh/highest-paying.htm

Doctors (and lawyers) need more advanced education, which means spending more money on education in order to make those big bucks.

Engineers don't need to do that in order to make big bucks.

Most engineers make medium-sized bucks at best, the floor is higher and the ceiling generally lower. Medicine has a higher floor and ceiling (much higher for a few outliers). Lawyers have a lower floor but a much higher ceiling. I have a number of peers from law school making 8 figures.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is five years after graduation. Further out it is the doctors who are making bank.

https://www.bls.gov/ooh/highest-paying.htm

Doctors (and lawyers) need more advanced education, which means spending more money on education in order to make those big bucks.

Engineers don't need to do that in order to make big bucks.

Most engineers make medium-sized bucks at best, the floor is higher and the ceiling generally lower. Medicine has a higher floor and ceiling (much higher for a few outliers). Lawyers have a lower floor but a much higher ceiling. I have a number of peers from law school making 8 figures.

Jeff Bezos, Elon MusK, Zerkuburg, Bill Gates, Zensen Huang, etc. are all engineer stem types. ceilings are way much higher in Tech

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is five years after graduation. Further out it is the doctors who are making bank.

https://www.bls.gov/ooh/highest-paying.htm

Doctors (and lawyers) need more advanced education, which means spending more money on education in order to make those big bucks.

Engineers don't need to do that in order to make big bucks.

Most engineers make medium-sized bucks at best, the floor is higher and the ceiling generally lower. Medicine has a higher floor and ceiling (much higher for a few outliers). Lawyers have a lower floor but a much higher ceiling. I have a number of peers from law school making 8 figures.

Your analysis is very flawed. If you make partner at one of the BigLaw law firms you can make 8 figures...but the vast, vast, vast majority don't ever make partner at a BigLaw law firm. Even 90% of associates that start at a BigLaw firm don't make partner. Many drop out on their own (because they hate it)...and then others are asked to leave because they don't have what it takes.

Medicine I kind of agree, but the median salary for all doctors in the DMV is $270k. Yes, that is a higher floor than an engineer...but with 4 years of medical school, residency, internship and probably 10 years of practice to hit that median salary. I get that other specialties can pay big bucks, but we can only go by the median for this thread.

By this logic, I guess I have to agree with the other poster...the most successful people on the planet are for the most part STEM people. The most successful lawyers on the planet are all plaintiff's attorneys that won big tobacco or other similar settlements, but then used that money to buy companies (and Judge Judy...yes she is one of the 10 highest NW law people). I think the highest NW lawyer is the guy that just sold the Baltimore Orioles and 90% of his NW was ownership of that team.

However, none of the lawyers I think are even in the Fortune 500 list.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sounds depressing. I was an art major and made $80k right after graduation. That was in 2002s dollars

You don't understand statistics, but then, you're an art major.

I'm work in statistics and I think PP does understand: you can't predict a single outcome from averages across such a broad category--especially one that does zero modeling of predictive factors and ignores important variabilities across institutions and important factors across time periods (e.g., what is the lifetime ROI). A better way to draw insight is that for any given person the profession that they are most likely to earn well in is the one where their skills and interests are the highest and that overlaps with an area that society is willing to pay. That is where an individual is likely to find their highest salary in an evolving career that will sustain over their lifetime. Much more sensible to introspect on that on some dumb averages about salary at 5 years that strips away all the predictive factors that will shape your individual outcome.

Nope. Majors and 5 year out is still a good reference assuming everything else is equal.

You can also look into 10 year 20 year or life time.

Uh, that was my point--why would we care about this given that there is no way to control for everything else being equal and it's the "everything else" that is the most relevant factor? As for lifetime impact, it's the variabilities around predictive factors and institutional differences that likely create the interaction effects over the lifetime.
And my response was to the sort of "stats shaming" of the art major using an anecdote when deriving individual meaning from these averages is pretty useless too.

Engineering is a surefire major (if you graduate with it) because it has with a relatively high floor, medium ceiling and relatively little impact from institutional quality so it's going to score well in averages because it has relatively little variability. Even adding some standard deviations around the majors' ROI would show a more interesting story, as would examining the outcomes of people who started an engineering major and had to switch. They might be more likely to be left in an institution without strengths in other majors and with a low GPA making transfer to a better school for their new major not easy. Who knows?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sounds depressing. I was an art major and made $80k right after graduation. That was in 2002s dollars

Why is it depressing? If you like STEM, it's a great area to major in. If you don't, pick what you like.

However, no parent should force their kid to major in STEM unless they like it, even if they would be good at it.

I have a CHemEng Major in their 2nd year. They love it, and actually hate when they have to take courses not in their major. Yes, they'd rather be taking Fluids and Thermo than a History course or Psychology course. For them they are just doing what they love with no pressure from us---if they wanted to major in English that would be fine.

However, you must realize that most Art Majors are NOT making $80K right after graduation, even now. Most might not even be employed in their "area of interest". On average it will take 5+ years to get a decent salary in many fields, and the first few years might be spent doing internships/working for lower wages or free to get your foot in the door in order to get on the career path you want.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Start high. Plateau early.

Many much more lucrative fields

This. I’m ChE. High out of school maxed early @165k

Engineers will typically max out in mid 100s to 200 tops (in HCOL areas). To go beyond that you typically need to go into management.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Engineers are hot out of the gate. There’s a natural ceiling though unless they move into management
It would interesting to see a comparison of 35 year old individual contributor engineers vs Director level folks with those dreaded Liberal Arts or Marketing degrees

Chance of a person with an engineering degree moving into management vs a person with liberal arts/marketing.

Where do you want to bet your money?

We are talking statistics, not some random anecdotes.

Plenty of engineers move into management at technical companies. Some choose not to and prefer to remain "mostly technical" positions. But the notion that engineers are not capable of moving into management is a bad stereotype. Firstly, you don't get to manage a bunch of engineers without being highly capable of actually doing their jobs---your Art History major is not doing a ChemEngs job in a pharmaceutical company---sure you might be selling the drug, but you are never going to be involved with development of the drug. That is not something you "learn on the job" like you can with Pharmaceutical sales