Which field of study gives the biggest chance for the highest salary?
We have the answer
We already know the results of the latest edition the Polish Graduate Tracking System. The study shows how the graduates from 2017 fare on the job market. The detailed results are available in the article ”Who wins in the particular fields of study?”.
Incomes in Poland vary greatly, depending on geography. For example, in 2017, the average income in Warsaw was over 6,000 PLN, and at the same time in the Kępiński poviat – less than 3,000 PLN. If one were to look solely at the nominal income of graduates, those universities fared better whose graduates live in rich cities and poviats where it is easy to get a well-paid job. That is why for the assessment of the economic situation of graduates ELA (Polish Graduate Tracking System) uses a Relative Indicator of Wages (in Polish: WWZ, względny Wskaźnik Zarobków). It determines the relation of average monthly wages of graduates of a given faculty to average monthly wages in their poviats of residence. It enables the comparison of graduates’ earning capability on dramatically different local job markets, and their changes over time.
IT professionals rule
It is not surprising, that graduates of exact and technical sciences command the highest salaries. Even though the ”data analysis-big data” programme at the Warsaw School of Economics is at the forefront, the overwhelming majority of best paying study programmes belong to the fields of study closely linked to information and technology. For example, individuals who graduated in analytical informatics at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków can expect monthly wages twice surpassing the average earnings in their place of residence (they earn 10,200 PLN on average). In the case of exact sciences, IT programmes are on top, starting with programmes at the AGH University of Science and Technology, Adam Mickiewicz University, University of Warsaw and University of Gdańsk. IT reigns supreme among the technical programmes as well. Graduates of AGH University of Science and Technology, Lodz University of Technology, Warsaw University of Technology, Gdańsk University of Technology, as well as the Siedlce University of Natural Sciences and Humanities can count on the best wages.
Among the universities with social sciences as their domain, graduates of programmes revolving around IT, and linked with business, can expect the biggest success. The undisputed leader is the Master’s Degree in advanced analytics – big data, at the Warsaw School of Economics which gives monthly wages two and a half times bigger than the average in places of residence of the graduates (monthly, over 9,700 PLN on average). Graduates of management and applied IT earn good salaries, too.
Three universities at the forefront
In life sciences, the best results are achieved by graduates of universities located in Warsaw, Wrocław, and Kraków. For example, the bioinformation technology graduates and those graduated from the biology of systems at the University of Warsaw earn one and a half times more than the average (if they had prior work experience). The graduates of these fields without work experience initially earn less than the average monthly wages in their places of residence (approximately 70 percent of the average). In the field of agriculture, forestry, and veterinarian studies, forestry graduates earn the highest monthly wages. For example, the graduates of this faculty from the Poznań University of Life Sciences can count on earnings exceeding the average monthly wages in their place of residence by over 50% (almost 5,900 PLN). Among the graduates of medical sciences, those who earned a degree in pharmacy or nursing from universities in: Wrocław, Toruń, Kalisz, Siedlce, Gdańsk, Opole, Poznań, and Łódź, earn relatively the most in comparison with the local average salaries.
A philologist will be fine
In the area of humanities, European studies graduates specializing in the European integration processes at the University of Warsaw can count on the highest monthly wages. Among the courses at the forefront of humanities, the biggest number is linked to foreign languages – Swedish, French, English, Dutch, Romance, Germanic. Among the five fields of study whose graduates earn the most (in the case of graduates with work experience during studies) three programmes are offered by the Jagiellonian University in Kraków. The worst off are graduates of art programmes. Even the highest paying courses provide for earnings below the local average. The instrumental studies at the Stanislaw Moniuszko Academy of Music in Gdansk are the only exception.
ELA knows everything about the economic fate of graduates
The Polish Graduate Tracking System (ELA) is developed by the National Information Processing Institute, and
commissioned by Ministerstwo Edukacji i Nauki. It aims to present the most comprehensive information on the situation
of graduates on the job market. The main source of information in the system are administrative data from two sources
– the Social Insurance Institution system (data, inter alia, about the professional situation of graduates:
employment, unemployment, wages) and the POL-on system (the Integrated System of Information on Science and Higher
Education), i.e. the information system about the higher education supporting the Ministerstwo Edukacji i Nauki (it
contains information, inter alia, on the education of university graduates). Currently, the ELA system generates five
types of reports about the economic fate of tertiary education graduates: Job search and unemployment, Wages, Work
before and after graduation, Work and further studies, Geographical differentiation of graduates’ fate.
