Anonymous
09/03/2025 10:14
Subject: What careers making 100,000 + as a new grad would you recommond for my daughter
Just go to a top school where the median starting salary is close to or over 100k.
Over 100k:
MIT, Stanford, Penn(Engineering is highest, Wharton next, CAS is under 100k but is getting close),
All ivies except Brown and Dartmouth are above 100k.
Duke like Brown and Dartmouth is just under 100k, JHU and Northwestern and Williams are a little lower than those.
Those # do not include the large proportion of undergrads at these schools who go to law, med, or grad school, the first two of which easily lead to careers where salaries even in the lower range are 200k+. Top law and most med specialties have means above 300k these days, at the partner level ie by age 30-32. phD in Stem in private industry (R&D) are often 200k+ fairly easy to achieve before age 30 due to PhD in most Stem fields being 5 yrs.
Hence it is not all about the starting salary, it is about the trajectory.
Some jobs start at 90-100k with a Bachelors yet cap around 115-120 or have high burnout/high turnover. Whereas a doctor or lawyer or others have a slower start to finish school/training but then have basically guaranteed top 2% salary for the entire career.
Better to focus on the long term fit in a career and/or a doctorate level degree that is in demand in high and low economies
Over 100k:
MIT, Stanford, Penn(Engineering is highest, Wharton next, CAS is under 100k but is getting close),
All ivies except Brown and Dartmouth are above 100k.
Duke like Brown and Dartmouth is just under 100k, JHU and Northwestern and Williams are a little lower than those.
Those # do not include the large proportion of undergrads at these schools who go to law, med, or grad school, the first two of which easily lead to careers where salaries even in the lower range are 200k+. Top law and most med specialties have means above 300k these days, at the partner level ie by age 30-32. phD in Stem in private industry (R&D) are often 200k+ fairly easy to achieve before age 30 due to PhD in most Stem fields being 5 yrs.
Hence it is not all about the starting salary, it is about the trajectory.
Some jobs start at 90-100k with a Bachelors yet cap around 115-120 or have high burnout/high turnover. Whereas a doctor or lawyer or others have a slower start to finish school/training but then have basically guaranteed top 2% salary for the entire career.
Better to focus on the long term fit in a career and/or a doctorate level degree that is in demand in high and low economies
Anonymous
09/03/2025 09:28
Subject: What careers making 100,000 + as a new grad would you recommond for my daughter
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Actuary!
What does it take to become an actuary?
Math skills + extreme lack of personality.
Actually not true. My friend is an actuary and at their firm they have a hard time finding people who can work with others. So yes, you need some basic social skills.
Lots of math, good social skills, the ability to communicate well and you are golden. But she has to be really analytical and like it.
Point made.
Anonymous
09/03/2025 06:40
Subject: What careers making 100,000 + as a new grad would you recommond for my daughter
Anonymous wrote:The good committed software engineers are fully employed and making 100k+ right out of college. The ones that have no interest and got the degree to make money are suffering
Partly agree with the above. The ones who took the more rigorous upper-level electives are fully employed and well-paid. The ones who took the easier upper-level electives are suffering.
Rigor matters, not just in HS but also in college and in life.
Anonymous
09/03/2025 06:34
Subject: What careers making 100,000 + as a new grad would you recommond for my daughter
Also, a Computer Engineer or EE with several of the skills below will be well paid and readily employable. People with several of these skills are in shortage (AI will not change this and they have been in shortage for 20+ years because these are hard/rigorous). Someone with several of the skills below will have no trouble finding a job. As with my above comment about CS upper-level electives, these are among the harder (more rigorous) topics than some others offered as upper-level electives in an ECE department
Verilog/VHDL programming (especially for FPGAs, but also for ASICs), Digital Communications, RF waveform design (especially CDMA and DSSS), EMI mitigation, SATCOM, Embedded / real-time systems, Matlab or Mathematica for numerical analysis, C/UNIX programming including either device drivers or Linux/BSD kernel internals or both). ARM assembly programming. Software Engineering.
Python is good for almost anyone to know, so worth learning, but it does not by itself move the needle. x86 CPUs are dying; the future is ARM (better performance, lower power, and leas expensive) Having several of the skills above will favorably move the needle at hiring time.
A Masters degree is not required, but it definitely can help if the student takes the more rigorous electives (see above). Masters degrees are pretty common in EE/ComputerE among people in industry -- often they are done part time while working and often tuition reimbursement is available from an employer. .
Verilog/VHDL programming (especially for FPGAs, but also for ASICs), Digital Communications, RF waveform design (especially CDMA and DSSS), EMI mitigation, SATCOM, Embedded / real-time systems, Matlab or Mathematica for numerical analysis, C/UNIX programming including either device drivers or Linux/BSD kernel internals or both). ARM assembly programming. Software Engineering.
Python is good for almost anyone to know, so worth learning, but it does not by itself move the needle. x86 CPUs are dying; the future is ARM (better performance, lower power, and leas expensive) Having several of the skills above will favorably move the needle at hiring time.
A Masters degree is not required, but it definitely can help if the student takes the more rigorous electives (see above). Masters degrees are pretty common in EE/ComputerE among people in industry -- often they are done part time while working and often tuition reimbursement is available from an employer. .
Anonymous
09/03/2025 06:29
Subject: What careers making 100,000 + as a new grad would you recommond for my daughter
6:26 again, and she’s not starting at 100k as an actuary even with that.
Anonymous
09/03/2025 06:26
Subject: What careers making 100,000 + as a new grad would you recommond for my daughter
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Actuary!
What does it take to become an actuary?
Math skills + extreme lack of personality.
Actually not true. My friend is an actuary and at their firm they have a hard time finding people who can work with others. So yes, you need some basic social skills.
Lots of math, good social skills, the ability to communicate well and you are golden. But she has to be really analytical and like it.
Anonymous
09/03/2025 06:15
Subject: What careers making 100,000 + as a new grad would you recommond for my daughter
Anonymous wrote:My daughter is not interested in nursing or healthcare which is a stable descent paying career to have a middle class life .
She wants to be a software engineer or a data scientist but is tech oversaturated now ? Also I have family members working in tech who have been laid off , and it took them months to find a job . Also outside of FAANG tech isn't as lucrative .
Tech is NOT oversaturated in general. Many of the people being laid off are "web programmers" with limited software skills.
As I have noted in other threads, CS majors should take the more rigorous upper-level CS electives (e.g., compilers, OS internals).
I am a hiring manager and see this: There is an ongoing shortage of people who can (a) write software in C for UNIX (includes Linux) and know how to use the debugger (eg., gdb or llvm equivalent), or (b) write C software for real-time / embedded systems including debugging, or (c) who know ARM assembly language programming and are comfortable debugging their code. There is a surplus of CS people who took the easy upper-level CS electives and only are skilled at scripting (PHP, Python, and such like).
Anonymous
09/03/2025 04:57
Subject: What careers making 100,000 + as a new grad would you recommond for my daughter
OP, you’re going to want to find a career that won’t be affected by AI. Bullhorn sales reps in coastal college towns have to be doing well. I hear American flags pre-treated with lighter fluid are going to be the next craze. Your daughter gets the New England sales territory for those & she will be a money MACHINE.
Anonymous
09/02/2025 22:58
Subject: Re:What careers making 100,000 + as a new grad would you recommond for my daughter
Private equity or finance (ie the Goldman analyst jobs).
Right now AI is the hottest skill and people are paying for it so if she can focus there she will be in a good place
Right now AI is the hottest skill and people are paying for it so if she can focus there she will be in a good place
Anonymous
09/02/2025 22:53
Subject: What careers making 100,000 + as a new grad would you recommond for my daughter
Law enforcement makes $100 with overtime.
Anonymous
09/02/2025 22:17
Subject: What careers making 100,000 + as a new grad would you recommond for my daughter
Big 4 pays new college grads $100k in VHCOL
Anonymous
09/02/2025 21:57
Subject: What careers making 100,000 + as a new grad would you recommond for my daughter
Anonymous wrote:Trapeze artist/circus performer ?
Good suggestion. 2-3 weeks training is about all you need. Same with astronaut.
Anonymous
09/02/2025 19:28
Subject: What careers making 100,000 + as a new grad would you recommond for my daughter
Trapeze artist/circus performer ?
Anonymous
09/02/2025 19:23
Subject: What careers making 100,000 + as a new grad would you recommond for my daughter
Anonymous wrote:What does your daughter need $100k out of college for? If she’s hyper intelligent, a PhD in stats, applied math, some fields of physics and CS will net her $200k+ near starting salary, but she needs to be really intelligent. Why not just do accounting?
Have you taken upper level accounting courses? These courses are not easy breezy. Lot more to accounting that intro financial and managerial courses.
Anonymous
09/02/2025 18:01
Subject: What careers making 100,000 + as a new grad would you recommond for my daughter
https://www.ice.gov/join is offering 50k sign on bonus