What do YOU consider a good starting salary for a graduate?

Best statistical sample size ever

Lol @ students clinging to hopes of £30k+.

Anything around £20k is a damn good starting salery for grads.

What youve gotta remember is new grads are a huge risk for companies. You cost alot in training and they have no idea how you'll perform. One girl on my company's grad scheme had a 1st class honours and a masters in IT.. and yet hardly performed at all.

My company's view is; Start on a low salery, prove yourself and then quickly rise.

I started on £15.5k which then rose to £28k in 6 months.

Don't know about Mercer but I think for Towers it's a bit more than that - something like £34k.

£35,000

£50,000 in London

A young person recently graduated from university desrves nothing less than this because in the 1960s that what most graduates earned in today's money. The baby-boomers had a number of jobs to choose from, and rents were reasonable in those days too. In the baby-boomers era, a typical recent graduate could rent a nice flat in a decent area all on their own, without having to take on flat-mates or live way the hell out in the outskirts of London.

That's why I say that if the world was fair and all generations had it equal, today's university graduates should earn at least, if not more than their parents and grandparents generation before them--as had been the case in the past. Unfortunately, real incomes have stagnated since 1966, but prices have risen. We have been forced to maintain our consumptive lifestyle throgh credit.

Yeah thought i had a decent set of data so I might as well put it to use... embarrassing really as im studying Physics and Maths :L

But seriously Medic in Raf from Imperial £50,000
Law from King's - No Job (1 Year)
NatSci from UCL - No Job (1 Year)

:O

Isn't NatSci one of those things where you have to have a higher degree to be of any use to any firm, like masters or PhD for research institutes?

Yes and the 'nice flat' in a 'decent area' was probably equipped with what we would term basics now, probably had a black and white TV and a wireless, no internet connection, no ipod, they didn't have mobile phones, their holidays would be to Bournemouth.

No. Not yet. But as I mentioned I have 6 Interviews/ACs and am waiting on a large number of graduate applications and all pay above £25k. I'll keep you updated if you really want.

Quite, and don't even ask how much a car was...

Where he has a point is in terms of a difference in expectations and also a difference in the relative price of food/heating/rent compared to the latest consumer goods.

Eg it does not cost that much to make one off purchases of X box, Kindle, the latest consumer gadgets etc are affordable to people on not great incomes. However if you are on a salary of sub £20k then the costs of housing and other basic living costs will take up most of your income.

With that said I think there are large marginal benefit gains when someone goes from say £21k upwards through to £35k as their general living costs will probably not change that much in that salary range, but their spare cash/ability to start saving in a pension/start saving for a deposit for a house increases rapidly. This is in the regions of course, obviously if you live in London the living costs are much greater.

From the people I know who are on grad schemes etc, those that are on £27/28k outside of London live pretty well. Not well enough to get expensive houses and run 2 cars etc, but they live a modest life with comfortable extras. Those that are on £18-20k find it tight.

Where he has a point is in terms of a difference in expectations and also a difference in the relative price of food/heating/rent compared to the latest consumer goods.

Eg it does not cost that much to make one off purchases of X box, Kindle, the latest consumer gadgets etc are affordable to people on not great incomes. However if you are on a salary of sub £20k then the costs of housing and other basic living costs will take up most of your income.

With that said I think there are large marginal benefit gains when someone goes from say £21k upwards through to £35k as their general living costs will probably not change that much in that salary range, but their spare cash/ability to start saving in a pension/start saving for a deposit for a house increases rapidly. This is in the regions of course, obviously if you live in London the living costs are much greater.

From the people I know who are on grad schemes etc, those that are on £27/28k outside of London live pretty well. Not well enough to get expensive houses and run 2 cars etc, but they live a modest life with comfortable extras. Those that are on £18-20k find it tight.

You are missing the biggest point I was trying to make.

A graduate in the 1950s and 1960s had a wide range of employment opportunities to choose from. It was a workers' market during the era when governments, both Labour and Conservative, were committed to maintaining an economic system that fostered full employment.

The result of this was employers competed with one another to recruit the best and the brightest. Workers could name their price, trade unions were strong, and yes, at times, because of full employment, inflation would get out of hand from time to time.

This type of a situation is just not what big business and City capitalists want. They want people begging for jobs. They want trade unions neutered, and they want people willing to work for any wage, work longer hours for less money and benefits, and they want desperate people willing to work under any conditions just so they have a job. They want workers fighting amongst themselves and competing for the less and less jobs available. When unemployment is high and inflation is low, big business and the venture capitalists are loving every minute of it. It means greater profits. When unemployment is low and inflation is rising, big business is forking out more money and taking in less profit. So you figure out who is winning the battle between capital and labour today. When capital can buy off politicians, monopolise the media, and therefore control governemt policy, they can control the economy and put it in the direction that generates most profits for them.

After two bloodthirsty world wars and the Great Depression, our ancestors had enough from the elites, and they demanded full employment and a welfare state as payback for the 30-40 years of intense suffering they had just endured. By the 1970s and 1980s, many people forgot about all the previous suffering and they were duped into giving up full employment, legitimacy for their trade unions and a compassionate safety net for a chance to play gambler on the now de-regulated share markets. Real wages never went up, but consumer goods became more available. People were forced to finance this growing consumerist society through debt and artifically inflated real estate values. Suddenly in 2007 the bubble burst and middle-class people are no longer secure or even employed.

Just no source on the whole wage thing...

You're just going to have to trust me on this one. It's late, and I don't feel like looking it up. Safe to say you'll find it on the BBC website, or anywhere else reputable on line. Robert Peston was just talking about it on that news special he did called, 'The Party's Over: How the West went Bust'. Look it up. He showed a myraid of graphs and tables that demonstrated amongst other things: the fact that real wages have not risen since the 1970s, A graduate's starting income was much higher in today's money during the era of full employment (1950s and 60s), etc.

You are missing the biggest point I was trying to make.

A graduate in the 1950s and 1960s had a wide range of employment opportunities to choose from. It was a workers' market during the era when governments, both Labour and Conservative, were committed to maintaining an economic system that fostered full employment.

The result of this was employers competed with one another to recruit the best and the brightest. Workers could name their price, trade unions were strong, and yes, at times, because of full employment, inflation would get out of hand from time to time.

This type of a situation is just not what big business and City capitalists want. They want people begging for jobs. They want trade unions neutered, and they want people willing to work for any wage, work longer hours for less money and benefits, and they want desperate people willing to work under any conditions just so they have a job. They want workers fighting amongst themselves and competing for the less and less jobs available. When unemployment is high and inflation is low, big business and the venture capitalists are loving every minute of it. It means greater profits. When unemployment is low and inflation is rising, big business is forking out more money and taking in less profit. So you figure out who is winning the battle between capital and labour today. When capital can buy off politicians, monopolise the media, and therefore control governemt policy, they can control the economy and put it in the direction that generates most profits for them.

After two bloodthirsty world wars and the Great Depression, our ancestors had enough from the elites, and they demanded full employment and a welfare state as payback for the 30-40 years of intense suffering they had just endured. By the 1970s and 1980s, many people forgot about all the previous suffering and they were duped into giving up full employment, legitimacy for their trade unions and a compassionate safety net for a chance to play gambler on the now de-regulated share markets. Real wages never went up, but consumer goods became more available. People were forced to finance this growing consumerist society through debt and artifically inflated real estate values. Suddenly in 2007 the bubble burst and middle-class people are no longer secure or even employed.

What are they in?