College Graduates Expect to Earn $ 60,000 – Here's What They're Earning

Most will earn more than $ 50,000.

PayScale estimates that the typical graduate with zero to five years of experience earns $ 48,400. The National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE) calculated that the preliminary average starting salary of graduates of the 2018 class was about $ 50,004.

NACE data also show that the starting salaries of university graduates have recently dropped slightly. The organization estimates that the starting salaries for the 2018 promotion were actually 2% lower than the 2017 average starting salary ($ 51,022).

Despite this statistic, college graduates have many good reasons to be optimistic. Wages are finally starting to fluctuate after years of sluggish growth and recent figures from NACE indicate that employers plan to hire 16.6% more members of the 2019 cohort than graduates the year before. This is the largest increase among recent graduates since 2007.

"If you are now a graduate of the university, you have perfectly programmed your time," CNBC Make Kr said, Brian Kropp, vice president of the Gartner research company. "It's hard to think of a better job market in which you could go."

Historically low unemployment rates are forcing companies to hire new graduates. The unemployment rate for all US workers is about 3.9%, but only 2.1% for workers with tertiary education.