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What's Your STEM Degree Worth?
Jim_Austin writes A recent study by economist Douglas Webber calculates the lifetime earnings premium of college degrees in various broad areas, accounting for selection bias--that is, for the fact that people who already are likely to do well are also more likely to go to college. These premiums are not small. Science Careers got exclusive access to major-specific data, and published an article that tells how much more you can expect to earn because you got that college degree--for engineering, physics, computer science, chemistry, and biology majors.
>> a job at the king does not need an 50-100K+ loan to get in.
Starbucks does
At the risk of using an ad hominem fallacy, a university professor personally benefits when people choose to attend college. An economist at a university should recuse himself from issuing reports that encourage people to contribute to his pension fund.
and for entry-level positions, we tend to ignore undergrad degrees entirely (great, you know how to learn... but what have you learned?).
Isn't the point of hiring for an entry-level position finding someone who knows how to learn? If you expect them to know it all already, it's not entry-level.
I went to my Social Security statement and added up my income since I graduated (Electronics Engineering degree (BSEE), 35 yrs. in my career until I retired). I stayed in the technical field (avoided management). The number: $2,727,247 I went to a community college and obtained my general education, later transferring to a state university. I'd estimate my total education cost at around $3K maximum (tuition was a whopping $59.65/qtr. when I graduated in '77). Starting salary was about $1.2k/month. Ending salary was about $10k/month. YMMV
I disagree. I worked for one of those "large computer companies". Most of our technical staff had a Bachelor's degree. A few had a Masters. There was zero pay difference between the B.S. degrees and M.S. degrees. It's all based on job performance. Ph.Ds were actually a disadvantage. Most managers stayed away from them because of the perception that they would be "bored" doing normal engineering jobs.