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THE AVERAGE GRADUATE starting salary has now exceeded €30,000, according to a new report.
The average starting salary is now €30,409, up from €29,060 last year, figures in the latest GradIreland salary and recruitment trends survey show.
In 2017, the average was €28,554 so this year’s figure is the largest scale increase of recent years.
This year’s survey shows that almost half (46%) of all graduates will earn between €20,000 and €30,000 as a starting salary, up sharply on last year.
Only 3% of employers offered salaries below the €20,000 mark in 2019.
Over a quarter of graduates (26%) will earn between €30,000 and €34,000, very similar to last year. The same number will earn in excess of this, significantly up on the 16% in this category in 2018.
Law is the best paid sector in this year’s survey, at €40,000, up from €30,000 in 2018.
A significant amount of salaries are now through the €30,000 barrier as a starting
salary, including banking, technology, engineering, retail and sales, logistics and transport and construction.
“These increases are indicative of both the competitive nature of graduate recruitment but in some sectors, they are also representative of the transformative effect of well remunerated graduate programmes launched by employers which have redefined these sectors in the eyes of many graduates, in retail for example,” the report notes.
According to the research, employers are increasingly concerned with what graduates expect when it comes to starting salaries. In last year’s data, 63% of employers felt that Irish graduates had realistic expectations when it came to assessing what they could earn at the start of their careers.
This year, only half of employers felt the same way; one-third (32%) said they felt that graduates had unrealistic expectations; while 18% were unsure.
Internships
Eight in 10 employers (81%) said they plan to either maintain or increase their levels of graduate recruitment next year.
The vast majority of employers surveyed (88%) offered work experience and/or internships, up from 80% last year.
Of this, 67% of employers said that they were primarily targeting undergraduates who were still pursuing their studies, while 33% said they were targeting both those still at third level and graduate job seekers.
Some 84% of employers said that they either expected their internship numbers to stay the same (52%) or grow (32%). Only 5% said they expected the number to decrease; 12% did not answer this question.
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…. but what is the MEDIAN starting salary? Billy the software engineer starting on €60k means that there are three more people are starting on €20k to make an average of €30k but average person or the median would be €20k. I really wish journalists all got a basic course in statistics.
@Thomas Hardiman: they are listed in the table above by profession so Billy, the software engineer on €60k is affecting anyone other than software engineers
@Thomas Hardiman: €30,409 is the median. They have taken the mean from each profession and multiplied by the number hired in each. Even if you didn’t realise this it is pretty obvious from reading the article if they are using the figure that 46% start with salaries below €30k that the median is just north of this number.
Not sure why you are so passionate about median and means but I hope you can calm down now.
@thephantomshit: you can’t calculate the median by averaging the means… The first poster is correct, the table only gives means, and the 46% earning under 30k figure either comes from separate data or is incorrectly derived from that data.
@Thomas Hardiman: I can tell you Billy the software engineer will never start on €60k. I can say this because I am a software engineer with over 3 years experience and not even close to 60k a year. I think your basic statistics are way off the mark here.
@SC: yikes – you’re right. I won’t be admitting I’m wrong again. This is a one off.
@thephantomshit: you weren’t far wrong, 46% earn 20-30 and 3% earn <20, so that's 49% of graduates earning <30 which would point to the median salary being around 30-31
@thephantomshit: fcukhtardo
Still don’t know why there is much a push to go to college ?? Looking at them figures a school leaver would be better served doing an apprenticeship
@John O Reilly: And retain is the second best paid in the table.
These are just the graduate salaries. According to the figures, a graduate in retail is better paid than someone in IT, however, 4-5 years later those figures would be very different once experience is gained. But you are correct, college is not for everyone, and its not the be all and end all.
Average in Dublin probably. Move to local towns and you won’t go beyond 35k for a 3yrs exp qualified accountant for example. Dublin = employees mkt, the rest of the country is an employers mkt
@RJ:
Shure wharever they get goes into the landlords market anyway!
@RJ: Not true. Most MNC’s outside of Dublin pay much better than their Dublin counterparts due to lower operation costs and the need to attract talent.
@ForeverFeel1ng:
MNCs will pay at local market rate in any area. Operational costs arent a factor in wages. Having worked for MNCs they tell us this to keep us from complaining. Talent is a concept, everyone is replaceable.
I would love to know where these jobs are. Im 5 years out of college with a BA and a Post Grad Diploma and stuck just shy of 30K. Spent the last year interviewing for higher paid roles in any industry with no offer.
@Niall Dunne: I would imagine that this study is based on large firms with dedicated Graduate recruitment plans. For example, looking at the retail and sales portion, I’d imagine that the likes of Aldi and Lidl who have a graduate programme paying €45-€50k upwards are featured here
@Niall Dunne: civil service? Starts low but goes up modestly with more stability than any low paid private sector job.
@Niall Dunne: I have to agree with you. I check the job market every now and then in my area of expertise and I can never find anything suitable. Engineering jobs in construction has a lot of options for sure but very little in electronics or semiconductor engineering.
Hahaa im an accountant and started on 19K in cork 3 years ago! This is way off or just in dublin
@Jasun Ó Cearnaigh: I’d imagine that this was with a small local firm? Anecdotally I hear that once accountancy graduates have their PQE done, they pretty much all leave their first employer for better paid in-house jobs or jobs with the large firms.
A local guy told me they offer low salaries for this reason – they know that after 2-3 years their employees will bugger off. Very short sighted I think but might explain your situation.
As mentioned above, I’d imagine the salaries listed are for the graduate placements with the likes of Deloitte, Accenture, KPMG etc – going by the number of placements studied ?
Accountants should be very worried because they will be replaced with software. Huge push in AI for accountancy.
Nope… On 24k as a research tech… In a government job!
@Cupid Stunt: oh… And that’s in Dublin!
@Cupid Stunt: good money for a Cupid Stunt ;-)
25K as a Financial Analyst in Dublin with a BA and 8 years out of college.
Law in Dublin and law outside the M50 are two very different things. Dublin competes with London for newly-qualified lawyers, especially solicitors. The salaries are high, but so is the PAYE so a huge chunk of the top line disappears. The expectation is to work 12-14 hour days and weekends, and when you factor in the cost of living in Dublin the amount of actual disposable income left isn’t what the headline figure might suggest.
Newly-qualified barristers earn very little for several years usually, unless they are particularly lucky to get instructed by solicitors who know they can perform competently.
Best paid sector for people that don’t create anything useful
@Kieran Stafford: I hope you never suffer medical negligence, wrongful arrest, fraud, exclusion from an inheritance, defamation etc….
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