Great News For College Grads: Starting Salaries Are Finally Back To Where They Were 10 Years Ago!

The Wall Street Journal and others are cheering today as a new study from executive search firm Korn Ferry International found that the “average base pay for college grads this year ticked to the highest level in at least a decade.”  We guess in the new millennial world that getting back to your original starting point is actually celebrated as an ‘accomplishment’.

“This has been the best year for students that I’ve seen since coming here,” said Thomas Ward, executive director of the career-services center at Adelphi University, in Garden City, N.Y., who joined the school in 2008. Some students at the school are fielding multiple job offers, allowing students to be choosier about where they ultimately land, he said. “It’s very rewarding.”

So where are new college graduates earning the most bank?  Well, average starting salaries for 2017 grads are just under $50,000 but software developers, engineers and actuaries, particularly those moving to San Francisco, can be expected to outperform that average by quite a bit. 

Here are the top 10 money makers for grads:

Of course, while this may all seem like a lot of money, with median rents in San Francisco still hovering around $3,200 per month that means that the average college graduate will be about $5,000 short of covering their annual rent payments…so looks like mom and dad will still get to cover a substantial portion of their daily living costs.

Meanwhile, on the bottom of the earnings rankings we find “category assistants”, whatever that is, and “call center specialists”, which we’re almost certain could be done without a $250,000 college degree…but what do we know?

Of course, higher salaries are only helpful if you’re among the graduates fortunate enough to find a job after graduation.  As we recently pointed out, according to the following chart from Bloomberg, there are 2.2 million millennials who live at home with mom but neither attend classes nor have a job.  Of those, 40% of them are already in their 30’s, they’re predominantly white and have a high school diploma of less.

But we would hate to rain on the daily parade of our snowflakes…so congrats on the “good news” day.