How To Become The Most Financially Successful After College (According To The Data)

As this college season is wrapping up, many graduates may be looking onward questioning what their expected financial future will look like, potentially not knowing what variables factor into the value of overall salary projections. For this project my primary research question was how does your major, college, and region really impact your projected salary after graduation? My data sources for this project would be a combination of 2017 salary data from PayScale, Inc. and two datasets obtained from the Wall Street Journal which contain information regarding projected salaries of different colleges and regions. By using EDA estimations, the data results could help potential new college recruits maximize their probability for financial success right out of college. To begin this analysis, we will start by finding what region will yield you the highest estimated financial returns depending on where you graduate from.

Should you be applying in specific areas to set yourself up for success based on the data?

From the visualization above, we can conclude that California schools will give you the highest probability of higher average starting salaries after graduation, while Northeastern regions have the highest density of schools, but shows a negative correlation with highest average starting salary. California has the least schools by region although contains the highest projected starting salary out of college. An explanation from this could be that the cost of living out in the California region is considerably higher which can result in the higher demand and average salary by region. We can see that Northeastern schools has the most schools by region although contains the lowest average of estimated starting salary out of college, showing us that if you are worried about hitting the ground running, avoid applying to Northeastern schools and try to get into California and Western universities to maximize your starting salary projections. Next up we will look at wether or not the “type” of school you apply to will change your salary estimations.

How much does the “type” of college you graduate from really impact your expected career salary?

The two plots above highlight that starting median salaries by school types appear to have a relatively linear growth over time, except for Ivy League. Ivy League graduates typically see an exponential growth between starting to mid career salaries. The growth trends continue by 3rd quarter of career and can be seen in the plot above indicating that your potential salary could almost triple by the individuals 3rd quarter salary estimations depending on if the graduate comes from an Ivy league or not. Another interesting trend that can be shown by the data is that “Party” schools generally show higher estimated starting median salaries compared to state schools, meaning that it’s totally fine to choose a part school over a state schools in terms of the change of financial projections, although State schools are shown to have lower starting salaries than even liberal arts academies. Next up we will look at majors/careers that do not start with high starting salaries, but contain a large increase in salary projections by mid-career which could potentially “pay you back” over time by the salary increase over time.

Top 20 majors that yield highest returns during mid-career salaries (degrees that can “pay you back” over time)

Most standard engineering majors see highest starting salaries, but majors such as philosophy, math, international relations, economics, marketing, physics, chemistry, journalism, and architecture see higher pay increase over time. In order to visualize and create a better foundational understanding for this starting to mid-career salary projected changes, we will use another plot visualization which will overlay the salary change over time. We can already conclude from the chart above that there are majors which lack high starting median salaries, but have potential to “pay you back” after increasing median mid-career salary trends over time. Thus, meaning that you may be able to start a career with minimal pay, but eventually lead to great financial success over time depending on the field.

How much does your major really impact your expected salary?

Some of the conclusions we can make based upon our data results indicate that starting median salaries are not a direct indicator for projected average median salaries mid-career. Regardless of your major, the potential for financial growth between career milestones could make up for lower initial starting median salary, and specific majors can “pay you back” quicker than others between starting and mid-career salary change. The “type” of school you graduate from does not all matter too much overall, due to the school type only slightly impacting the estimated salary projections, shows regular linear growth over time, besides Ivy League schools which experience a more exponential growth from starting the 3rd quarter salary projections.

Based upon the data, If you want to make the big bucks right off the jump:

• Apply to schools within the California or Western regions
• Major in any of the primary engineering studies or medical/nursing in order to begin with high projected starting salaries
• Try to get into Ivy League schools in order to have highest exponential growth between starting and mid-career median salaries