Salary research for post grad first timers

People with post grad qualifications are commanding starting salaries of $60,000 plus in their first jobs, according to new research.

According to Graduate Careers Australia male post grads also earned between $2,000 and $13,000 more than female post grads.

The GCA research found post grads with a research master’s degree or PhD earned a median annual salary of $60,000 in 2007 for their first job.

People with post grad qualifications commanded starting salaries of $60,000 plus in their first jobs last year, according to new research. Looking at the difference in salary levels between 2006 and 2007, the Graduate Careers Australia research also found male post grads earned between $2,000 and $13,000 more than female post grads. The GCA research found post grads with a research master’s degree or PhD earned a median annual salary of $60,000 in 2007 for their first job. This was up from a median starting salary of $56,000 in 2006.

CGA found graduates with a master’s coursework degree began their full-time careers on $50,000 – the same salary level as 2006). People with a postgraduate diploma or certificate started on $49,100 in their first full-time job, up from $47,000 in 2006.

GCA has released two new reports examining the experience of recent postgraduates both during and after their study – Postgraduate Destinations 2007, and Postgraduate Research Experience 2007.

The key findings were:

• Median salaries for all full-time employed postgraduates at each of the three main award levels – postgraduate diplomas and certificates, master’s degrees by coursework and research master’s and PhDs – increased by between $2,000 and $3,300 between 2006 and 2007.
• The median salary for postgraduate diploma or certificate graduates was $57,000.
• The median salary for graduates with coursework master’s awards was $68,000.
• The median salary for those with a research master’s or PhD was $64,000. At research masters/PhD level, male postgraduates reported median annual salaries $2,000 higher than female post grads.
• At postgraduate diploma/certificate graduate level and coursework masters graduate level, males earned up to $13,000 more than their female counterparts.

Quoting directly from the GCA media release: Across all three main levels of postgraduate qualifications, there were notable differences between the median earnings of graduates with previous full-time experience and those entering their first full-time employment.

Research masters and PhD postgraduates in their first full-time employment earned a salary 6.2 per cent less than the salary earned by all postgraduates at this level. Coursework master’s degree graduates in their first full-time employment earned a salary 26.5 per cent less than the salary earned by all at this level. New postgraduates with a diploma or certificate in their first full-time employment earned a salary 14.0 per cent less than the salary earned by all at this level.

• A large majority of postgraduates available for full-time work were in a full-time position at the time of the survey (89.5 per cent). This is a minor decrease from the previous year by 0.4 of a percentage point.