New-Graduate Salaries
For newly minted graduates in chemically related fields, 2012 was a better year to find a job than previous years, as the unemployment rate for those looking for work fell from 13.3% in 2011 to 12.6% in 2012. Despite the slight drop in unemployment, median starting salaries for new Ph.D. and master’s degree recipients also dropped and those for bachelor’s earners stayed flat. These findings come from the annual American Chemical Society survey of new graduates in chemistry and related fields. Gareth S. Edwards of the ACS Department of Research & Member Insights conducts the survey under the guidance of the ACS Committee on Economic & Professional Affairs. The 2012 survey was sent to 12,132 recent graduates in early October 2012, and data were collected until January 2013. In all, the new grads returned 2,012 usable responses for a response rate of 16.6%. The respondents can be divided into several ...