Average salaries of Engineering, BA, and LAS

[Gooblah]

At the start and in mid career, an Engineering guy is going to make more. A really elite liberal arts major can prob outearn the Engineer by getting into management though. Its all moot, because our K12 system doesn't prepare enough candidates to become Engineers, and we don't have enough Engineering jobs open to take them all, even if we all did (plus, Engineering wages would fall if they became less scarce).

Really? AFAIK at most engineering firms/government science-type agencies (EPA, NASA, etc.), lower to mid-range management tends to have engineering degrees, as do the founders or whatnot. It's really that layer between the top and the middle that tends to be more liberal-arts oriented, at least from my (albeit limited) experience, and anecdotal evidence.

 

[innonimatu]

1) That does not seem completely true as the developed world continues to import people with technical backgrounds from the third world. Look at the amount of chinese and indians working on technical stuff in the US, for instance

Yeah, and most of those I've met (it's anecdotal, I'll admit) are crappy engineers, working for an appropriately crappy pay.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

I guarantee there are plenty of jobs for ALL moderately competent engineers in the world. That's right, if you're a moderately competent engineer and you're willing to relocate there's no way in hell you'll be unemployed for long

Maybe if my "moderately competent" you mean experienced, but so far finding entry level civil engineering positions has proven tough.

 

[really]

I'm not sure why there is such an emphasis on starting salaries - is it because of the debt you graduate with in the USA?

Money isn't everything*

(*It is easy for me to say this as I had a great time in college, graduated without debt into a booming ((bubble)) economy and have a good job and little expenses)

Looking through this table from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics the most surprising difference to me is that men earn so much more than women.
http://www.bls.gov/cps/cpsaat39.pdf

 

[luiz]

Maybe if my "moderately competent" you mean experienced, but so far finding entry level civil engineering positions has proven tough.

Maybe in the US, with the housing crash and all that. But half of the world is living a construction boom and civil engineers are on high demand.

I don't know a single civil engineer who could not find a good entry level job in less than two months (I know about 10 people from school who graduated in civil engineering, all of them are doing very good). Throughout South America there is a big deficit of civil engineers, I bet the same is true in Asia.

That's why I said "if you're willing to relocate". Naturally in some areas the market for engineers may be tough. That was the case in Brazil in the 80's and early 90's, when a lot of engineers either went to finance or relocated abroad. But even in that grim scenario they all made ends meet well enough.

 

[JerichoHill]

I went to public universities for undergrad and grad
I make 6 figs.

Just be smart with what you choose. If you choose a major with alot of supply in it, you're going to drive down the wage you can command....Simple S/D graph

 

[downtown]

Really? AFAIK at most engineering firms/government science-type agencies (EPA, NASA, etc.), lower to mid-range management tends to have engineering degrees, as do the founders or whatnot. It's really that layer between the top and the middle that tends to be more liberal-arts oriented, at least from my (albeit limited) experience, and anecdotal evidence.

You may be right, I wasn't thinking about labs or actual engineering firms, just other businesses that happen to employ engineers. My last two companies employ several, and they make very good money, but there aren't too many of them managing departments or in the corporate offices, and our best salespeople/SVP-level execs make more than they do.

 

[BvBPL]

Sociology --- $33,280

Now, last I checked about 70% or more of our college people where majoring in Liberal Arts. This. coupled with the fact that most growing fields(by jobs) are in the more technical fields. Does this mean, we will continue to have more unemployed or poor college grads?

I don't know if I would necessarily consider a 22 year-old earning $30k poor.
Certainly, one would want to earn more, but bear in mind that these are the starting salaries for people who just graduated college.

 

[Archbob]

I don't know if I would necessarily consider a 22 year-old earning $30k poor.
Certainly, one would want to earn more, but bear in mind that these are the starting salaries for people who just graduated college.

That's if the sociology major can even find a job which in today's economy is quite questionable.

 

[downtown]

I don't know if I would necessarily consider a 22 year-old earning $30k poor.
Certainly, one would want to earn more, but bear in mind that these are the starting salaries for people who just graduated college.

Depends on their debt levels. A 22 year old with few obligations can live pretty well on 30K. One with even a very modest debt amount (15K or so) could struggle, as more than 10% of their take home pay would be towards debt relief.

 

[downtown]

Okay, so I found this chart on the WSJ today, and I think the unemployment data is pretty important in our previous discussions on how "english majors are worthless".

http://graphicsweb.wsj.com/documents/NILF1111/#term=

English majors have an unemployment rate of 6.7%, behind COMPUTER ENGINEERING (7%), MATERIALS ENGINEERING AND MATERIALS SCIENCE (7.7%), and ELECTRICAL AND MECHANIC REPAIRS AND TECHNOLOGIES, a "trade" that many posters have recommended (8.4%).

My liberal arts degree (Political Science), has a lower unemployment rate than MECHANICAL ENGINEERING RELATED TECHNOLOGIES, ENGINEERING MECHANICS PHYSICS AND SCIENCE and ECONOMICS.

Obviously, at the top end, Engineering related fields have higher salaries than many liberal arts degrees, but I don't think we should paint college-unemployment as just guys who majored in underwater basket weaving.

But seriously, don't major in Library Sciences. Or PSYCHOLOGY, which has a nearly 20% unemployment rate!

 

[Archbob]

Downtown, your realize there's like a $26,000 gap between the average salaries of computer engineering and English right(that is starting, median, and top 25%)?


Are those straight out of Undergrad stats and do they include underemployment?

Also, these are college major stats, don't see stats for electrician, plumbing, mortician, etc.

 

[Samez]

WolframAlpha provides interesting results on average salary for many employment fields.

 

[downtown]

Downtown, your realize there's like a $26,000 gap between the average salaries of computer engineering and English right(that is starting, median, and top 25%)?


Are those straight out of Undergrad stats and do they include underemployment?

Also, these are college major stats, don't see stats for electrician, plumbing, mortician, etc.

I believe these are stats for the entire workforce, not just in the first 4 years out of college, and they're just for bachelors degrees.

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that Engineers make more than a typical liberal arts major. Duh. However, I think this shows that some of these majors are not as "worthless" or unemployable as some folks here make them out to be. If unemployment is your biggest worry, its still smarter to get an English degree (and do well) than it would be to not go to college.

As for a trade, I'm not sure we track data specifically on those who complete electrical trade school, but the construction industry as a whole has over 10% unemployment.

 

[Hehehe]

From downtown's link (sorted by unemployment, median salaries included):

CHEMICAL ENGINEERING 3.8% $86,000
MECHANICAL ENGINEERING 3.8% $81,000
ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING 5.0% $86,000
POLITICAL SCIENCE AND GOVERNMENT 6.0% $57,000
ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE 6.7% $48,000
LIBERAL ARTS 7.6% $48,000

I assume that this statistic includes people who are underemployed, as they do not seem to mention otherwise. What I really would like to know is how many people are employed in their fields (then again, I'm not even sure what an English major is supposed to prepare one for)

 

[Akka]

Man wouldn't it be awesome if everyone automatically knew what they really wanted to do so they could be sure to plop down the money/take out the massive loans required for the more specialized and/or difficult and longer degrees instead of feeling forced to go to college right or soon after graduating highschool because of the pressure put on them to go to college and get a degree.

Bloody magic man, bloody magic.

Don't forget they also all magically succeed in their studies, and nobody ever fail and still have to pay back all these loan.

I mean, in movies you just have to look harshly at the camera and walk a brisk pace, then you have a twenty seconds montage showing how you work hard, and DING you've got your doctorate ! It can't possibly be difficult and only the bad guy fail (because he's not nice, obviously) !

 

[downtown]

Right, I think the underemployment aspect is the biggest issue. If you major in Chemical Engineering, you aren't starting at 31K, whereas anybody starting out in general business might. The bottom 25% salaries for Engineers are close to double what other entry level openings may be. This is where the issue of student debt comes up. You can afford to borrow a pretty significant amount of money as an Engineer and not have it really hurt you...but for say, an International Relations major, who still stands a perfectly good chance of making a healthy living, it can be a major problem, when he has to make 34,000 until he turns 28.

This article http://enr.construction.com/busines...4-constructionsjoblessrategoesupinoctober.asp says that construction related fields had an unemployment rate of over 13%, and various other googling shows the number usually over 12%.

 

[Archbob]

I don't think plumbers and electricians count as construction though. But I wouldn't be surprised if they had a decent unemployment %.

 

[downtown]

I don't think plumbers and electricians count as construction though. But I wouldn't be surprised if they had a decent unemployment %.

Electricians do...I'm not sure if plumbers do. Most of their business comes from new installations. Without construction (either commerical or residential), demand for installing crashes...then you're only making money on maintaining systems.

 

[squall78]

http://graphicsweb.wsj.com/documents/NILF1111/#term=

thoughts?