What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

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TheDev
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What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by TheDev »

After college, your first real job, how much were you making? I'll start: $54,000.

Edit: Please take inflation into consideration! Calculate for today's dollars.
Last edited by TheDev on Wed Aug 08, 2012 3:38 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Aptenodytes
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by Aptenodytes »

er, don't you need to denominate the results in constant dollars?
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by nisiprius »

After college, grad school, on a fellowship with a stipend of $2,400/year.

After grad school, first real job, $13,500 a year. My college tuition was $1,700 a year, an exorbitant amount that provoked annual tuition riots.

Why, yes, there was a lot of inflation during the 1970s.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by nodenuff2 »

550 a month . I was told if I did a good job I could expect 50 month raise. And a car. What a deal. Turned down 2 jobs paying 800. a month. 41 years later I am still working for that company. ps I did a little better than 50 a month increase.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by cheese_breath »

$500 per month in June 1964.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by TSR »

$9/hr in New York City in 2001 just after September 11. In retrospect, August 2001 was a bad time to move to NYC with a BA in English and no job.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by 2wolves »

[Inappropriate remark removed by admin LadyGeek]
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by Sheepdog »

$555 a month ($6,600 annually) in 1960, which was much higher than any wage my father ever earned. That was the highest salary of any other Univ. of Fla. Chemical Engineering graduate in my class that year. I reached the magic $10,000 annual income in 1965.
Jim

EDIT: According to US Inflation Calculator http://www.usinflationcalculator.com/, that $6,600 1960 salary would be $51,633 in 2012 dollars.
Last edited by Sheepdog on Wed Aug 08, 2012 3:26 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by tomd37 »

Went to Navy OCS in January 1961 and upon commissioning in June 1961 my base pay was $222.30 per month until my next promotion 18 months later. :moneybag
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by Sunflower »

$0.

I didn't go to college.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by TheDev »

2wolves wrote:
TheDev wrote:After college, your first real job, how much were you making? I'll start: $54,000.
Not much, but I invested it all in a Roth IRA paying 8% and now I'm rich!
I take it you are retired now?
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by Petrocelli »

First real job as a lawyer: base salary of $32,500 in 1984.

To adjust in today's dollars: Base salary out of law school at my firm is now $105,000.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by TheDev »

Sheepdog wrote:$555 a month ($6,600) in 1960, which was much higher than any wage my father ever earned. That was the highest salary of any other Univ. of Fla. Chemical Engineering graduate in my class that year. I reached the magic $10,000 annual income in 1965.
Jim
$555 in 1960 = $6,600 today? Really? I didn't realize inflation was that crazy.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by NAVigator »

1975 starting salary was $10,000 annually developing software.

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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by Sheepdog »

TheDev wrote:
Sheepdog wrote:$555 a month ($6,600 annually) in 1960, which was much higher than any wage my father ever earned. That was the highest salary of any other Univ. of Fla. Chemical Engineering graduate in my class that year. I reached the magic $10,000 annual income in 1965.
Jim
$555 in 1960 = $6,600 today? Really? I didn't realize inflation was that crazy.
According to US Inflation Calculator http://www.usinflationcalculator.com/, that $6,600 1960 salary would be $51,633 in 2012 dollars. Yes, inflation was that crazy.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by SRenaeP »

$50K in 1999 in the Bay Area. For another point of reference, I also had offers for $40K in NYC and $40K(?) in Atlanta.

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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by GregLee »

$10,500 in 1971 ($59,494 in 2012 dollars).
Greg, retired 8/10.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by hicabob »

24k/yr - cranking code for a chip design tool company in lovely Mountainview - 1980 - seemed nice at the time.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by Aptenodytes »

$15k in 1981 / $37.9k in 2012 dollars
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by etarini »

I made $75/week ($3,900/year) in June 1972; that would be $411.74/week and $21,410.48 in 2012 dollars.

The official link to the Bureau of Labor Statistic's calculator (which yields the same results) is http://www.bls.gov/data/inflation_calculator.htm

The http://www.usinflationcalculator.com link says: "US Inflation Calculator is a part of the CoinNews family of Web sites"

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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by TheDev »

Petrocelli wrote:First real job as a lawyer: base salary of $32,500 in 1984.

To adjust in today's dollars: Base salary out of law school at my firm is now $105,000.
Is your firm in a big city? Did you go to a big school?
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by mlipps »

Why are you so insistent on knowing how much people make? I find it sort of rude and very pushy.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by mlipps »

TheDev wrote:
Sheepdog wrote:$555 a month ($6,600) in 1960, which was much higher than any wage my father ever earned. That was the highest salary of any other Univ. of Fla. Chemical Engineering graduate in my class that year. I reached the magic $10,000 annual income in 1965.
Jim
$555 in 1960 = $6,600 today? Really? I didn't realize inflation was that crazy.
No I think he meant $555x12=$6600.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by Tim_in_GA »

$52K in 1993 or about $91K in today's dollars
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by TheDev »

mlipps wrote:Why are you so insistent on knowing how much people make? I find it sort of rude and very pushy.
Rude? :confused

I'm interested in investing, and I want to be able to compare the amount of money I have to invest against the amounts that others started out with. If you don't like it, you don't have to answer the question.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by TheDev »

Tim_in_GA wrote:$52K in 1993 or about $91K in today's dollars
what do you do? Are you in a high cost of living area?
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by JDCPAEsq »

Out of college - $1.75 an hour after graduating from the Wharton School at Penn. Summer job before starting law school. Wharton graduates don't always make big bucks. :happy
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by Tim_in_GA »

TheDev wrote:
Tim_in_GA wrote:$52K in 1993 or about $91K in today's dollars
what do you do? Are you in a high cost of living area?
I started out as an electrical engineer in Indiana. They put me in an hourly pay grade because there was a hiring freeze for salaried positions. With overtime I made out pretty well.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by travelnut11 »

$31k, 1999, Washington DC, research assistant. I thought I was rich after living on $600 per month my last year of college! :D
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by Petrocelli »

TheDev wrote:
Petrocelli wrote:First real job as a lawyer: base salary of $32,500 in 1984.

To adjust in today's dollars: Base salary out of law school at my firm is now $105,000.
Is your firm in a big city? Did you go to a big school?
Yes and yes.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by englishgirl »

£10,500

Which, when converted to US dollars using the correct exchange rate on the day, and THEN adjusted for inflation (look at all this math you made me do!) comes to...$34,879.95 in 2012 dollars.

Now I feel hosed. :(
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by 22twain »

My first job out of college was as a teaching assistant in graduate school: $5-6K in 1975 (don't remember the exact amount) = $22-26K now.

My first "real" job after graduate school was as a visiting assistant professor (temporary replacement for a prof on sabbatical): $20K in 1983 = $46K now.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by PennySaved »

$28,000 in 1982 as a chemical engineer. I don't know what that is in today's dollars.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by gravlax »

$75K/yr. in 1996.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by TheDev »

gravlax wrote:$75K/yr. in 1996.
what do you do? was this job in a high cost of living area?
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by dad2000 »

Using CPI adjustments, $37,000 in 2012 USD, but I took the job one year before graduating college, as I was on my own and also needed to make a living.

I took a different job one year after graduating, for $55,000 in 2012 USD.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by bhead33 »

$40k a year in 2004 in Fl. $48,592.48 today.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by Leif »

$85,000. That is surprising.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by sscritic »

$45,000 in first real job (not graduate assistant).

P.S. To the doubters about what new lawyers can make. My son-in-law started at $125k in 2002, which is over $150k in 2010 dollars (the inflation calculator only goes to 2010). Big city, big firm, not so big school.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by sscritic »

To the OP. If you wanted to know what people did and where they worked, you should have asked in your OP. You only asked for salary.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by dad2000 »

sscritic wrote:$45,000 in first real job (not graduate assistant).

P.S. To the doubters about what new lawyers can make. My son-in-law started at $125k in 2002, which is over $150k in 2010 dollars (the inflation calculator only goes to 2010). Big city, big firm, not so big school.
On the flip side, I know of some recent law school graduates from big city/not-so-big-school either unemployed or struggling to make $40K.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by TheDev »

sscritic wrote:To the OP. If you wanted to know what people did and where they worked, you should have asked in your OP. You only asked for salary.
I made a thread like that, but people complained that asking all those questions was too personal.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by TheDev »

sscritic wrote:$45,000 in first real job (not graduate assistant).

P.S. To the doubters about what new lawyers can make. My son-in-law started at $125k in 2002, which is over $150k in 2010 dollars (the inflation calculator only goes to 2010). Big city, big firm, not so big school.
Did he know some bigshot that helped him get his foot in the door?
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by fishnskiguy »

Graduated in 1965, commissioned Ensign, US Navy. TomD's $222.30 per month was increased to $240.00 the year before I graduated. Plus we got $30.00 per month food allowance which Tom forgot to mention. In today's dollars that was a whopping $23,592 per year total.

Military pay was terrible until we went to an all volunteer military in the mid 1970's. It was so bad that the Social Security Administration in later years bumped up all military pay in those early years for SS calculation purposes.

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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by sscritic »

TheDev wrote: Did he know some bigshot that helped him get his foot in the door?
No, but I did know someone who worked in their accounting department (I don't think she sat in on the hiring decision). Those were starting salaries in 2002 at big firms in big cities.

Here is some data (not restricted to big cities):
Median Starting Salaries for First-Year Associates by Firm Size
1998 75,000
1999 85,000
2000 110,500
2001 110,200
2002 110,000
2003 107,000
2004 110,000
2005 110,000
2006 120,000
2007 130,000
2008 135,000
2009 145,000
http://www.nalp.org/2009septnewassocsalaries

Note the jump from 1998 to 2000; the plateau from 2000 to 2005; and the jumps that followed 2005.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by runner26 »

12000 per year in 1974, or 55856 inflation adjusted.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by bigred77 »

$58,000 out of undergrad 4 years ago in a moderately low cost of living area.


To the OP in regards to Law School, BigLaw, and or knowing a partner to get your foot in the door:

Law School is very lopsided. The market for law school grads is not the greatest right now. Less than 10% of Law School grads land a coveted "BigLaw" gig that pays 6 figures freshout and usually tops out around $160k/yr these days plus bonus.

To get one of these jobs you need to have great grades at a "top 14" law school, have some connections, or be at the very top of your class in a second tier school.

If you don't make that you'll be lookin at salaries less than what you make now.

Edited to add: if you do land one of these spots, you will earn your money. Longer hours and probably more stress than you can imagine.
Last edited by bigred77 on Wed Aug 08, 2012 4:50 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by Cuzz35 »

$52,000 starting January 1, 2013.

Tax accountant pre-cpa, graduate degree.
Medium firm in Atlanta.
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by pablolo »

after college, graduate school. starting salary $6900 -high school teacher (1976). big bucks
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Re: What was Your Starting Salary Out of College?

Post by Steelersfan »

$12,500 in 1971 for an IT job with two years of graduate school on my resume.

The calculator says that's $70,800 today.

I wouldn't be able to get that much in today's job market.
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