salaries
ENGINEERING DEGREES PAY OFF Latest salary surveys confirm that chemical engineers earn more than chemists Michael Heylin C&EN Washington embers of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE) responding to the institute's recent biennial salary survey earned a median full-time base salary of $68,200 in 1995. This is 7.2% more than the $63,600 median for 1993. The rise in the Consumer Price Index over this two-year period was 5.5%. This $68,200 median salary for chemical engineers is $8,200 higher than the median salary of $60,000 reported as of March 1 by chemists responding to this year's annual survey of American Chemical Society members. This represents a more modest 3.6% two-year increase for chemists as a group. Preliminary data from the ACS survey were reported in C&EN (July 29, page 10). Subsequent reexamination of the survey in light of problems with drawing the survey sample from the database of current members has resulted in mostly slight modifications to some of the data. These changes do not significantly affect
Are younger... Median age
Chemical engineers
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the major findings and trends indicated by the survey. The biggest change is a drop in the number of respondents unemployed but not seeking employment from 34% to 2.3%. The salary differences revealed by the AIChE and ACS surveys between chemical engineers and chemists are particularly striking at the bachelor-degree level— an overall median of $62,000 for chemical engineers and $45,000 for chemists. At the doctoral level, the salary advantage to chemical engineers is smaller, $76,900 compared with $68,000. For those with master's degrees, the edge is $70,000 compared with $53,600. The AIChE survey also identifies a master's of business administration (M.B.A.) category, which has a $77,000 median salary. Of AIChE member respondents who are in the workforce—either employed or looking for a job—94.8% report that they are employed full time—91.6% with salaried jobs plus 3.2% self-employed. In addition, 2.7% are working part time and 2.5% are unemployed but seeking employment. On a similar basis, 91.5% of the chem-
More likely to work for industry
39
Chemical engineers ;;Çh$mi^t$.,
Considerably better paid . . . Ph.D. chemical engineers $76,900 $68,000 Ph.D. chemists M.S. chemical engineers $70,000 $63,600 M.& chemists Β,& chemical engineers , , $6^000.
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90%
Less likely to have a Ph.D Chemical engineers Chemists 20% 56% ph.a 10% — M.BA :,y$m,. ;2r».%'„;.:s.
Less likely to be a woman . . . Chemical engineers 11 %
ists in the workforce responding to the ACS survey are employed full time, 2.8% are on postdocs or fellowships, 2.7% have part-time jobs, and 30% are unem ployed but seeking employment. Both societies' surveys were conduct ed in the early months of this year. Both involved the mailing of questionnaires to a random sample of their membership. And both attempted to exclude members who are not in the workforce—students and retirees. This year's AIChE survey polled 12,600 members. It received almost 4,100 responses. Salary data are largely based on the almost 3,200 full-time sala ried employees who provided base-salary figures. This year, ACS received 10,000 re sponses from the 20,000 members it polled. Of the respondents, 9,200 are chemists. AIChE believes that unemployed members may be less inclined than em ployed ones to respond to its survey. The institute believes that the apparent 2.5% unemployment rate indicated by its sur vey is too low. It states that other data from its membership records indicate a member unemployment rate of 5.3%. Of those responding to the AIChE sur vey, 49% hold a bachelor's degree and 21% have a master's, 10% an M.B.A., and 20% a doctorate. Just over 11% of them are women. Except for a slight excess of M.B.A.S, this breakdown closely resem bles the makeup of the membership of AIChE. The median age of the respon dents is 39. Chemists responding to the ACS sur vey show a different academic profile— 56% Ph.D.s and 26% bachelor's—and are twice as likely to be women—23%. Their median age is 42. Data from the AIChE survey indicate that the median increase for individual chemical engineers reporting base sala ries for both 1994 and 1995 was 4.5%. This is essentially the same as the parallel year-to-year increase for individual chem ists reported in the ACS survey. Comparison of data from the two sur veys indicates that a doctorate brings less salary advantage to a chemical engineer than it does to a chemist. For instance, the overall median salary for full-time sal aried Ph.D. chemical engineers is 24% higher than the median for their col leagues with bachelor's degrees. For chemistry, this differential is 51%. Long-service bachelor-level chemical engineers do especially well. Those with more than 20 years of work experience SEPTEMBER 23, 1996 C&EN 71
salaries
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Salaries of older B.S. chemical engineers are especially strong Years of work experience
Male chemical engineers have big salary advantage Degree
Total
B.S.
M.S.
$45.5 56.4 66.6 76.0 82.3
$43.5 53.8 65.0 73.5 80.4
$46.0 54.7 65.0 73.1 75.9
$47.5 62.0 66.3 77.9 86.4
89.8 90.0 87.8 79.5 68.2
86.4 83.1 89.3 73.2 62.0
87.9 90.8 75.3 80.6 70.0
94.9 95.8 86.5 68.1 77.0
M.B.A.
Men
Women
$ 60.3 67.2 75.2 86.2 89.7
$46.0 57.6 67.0 76.7 82.4
$44.4 52.1 63.0 68.6 nm
100.0 94.9 90.4 96.1 76.9
90.0 90.0 87.8 79.5 78.2
nm nm nm nm 51.9
Ph.D.
Median base salary ($ thousands)
Up to 5 6-10 11-15 16-20 21-25
26-30 31-35 36-40 More than 40 Total sample
nm = not meaningful because sample set is small. Source: AlChE Salary Survey '96
enjoy a median salary of well over $80,000. This is about $20,000 more than for bachelor-level chemists—and at least $5,000 more than for doctoral chemists—with the same amount of experience. The salary advantage for chemical engineers over chemists partly reflects who they work for. Of chemists responding to the ACS survey, 62% work for industry, 26% are in academia, 7% in government, and 5% have other nonacademic jobs. AlChE does not break down its respondents in this way. However, indications from other data are that at least 90% of them are employed by relatively higher paying industry. If the AlChE data are compared with ACS data for industrial chemists only, the differences do, indeed, lessen somewhat. At the Ph.D. level, the median of $75,000 for chemists is close to the $76,900 median for chemical engineers. For master's, the comparison becomes $57,000 for chemists, $70,000 chemical engineers. However, the median for industri-
al bachelor-level chemists of $45,700 is up only marginally from the $45,000 for all bachelor chemists and still well below the $62,000 median for B.S. respondents to AIChE's survey. The difference in salaries between men and women is seemingly very large in chemical engineering—a median of $78,200 for men, 51% higher than the $51,900 for women. This compares with a 37% advantage for male over female chemists—$63,000 versus $46,000. In both cases, this difference involves many factors—including degree level, amount of experience, and nature of employment. In the case of chemical engineers, age is apparently very significant. The median salary for women chemical engineers responding to AIChE's survey with up to five years of professional experience is $44,400. This is close to the $46,000 median for men in this category. However, this youngest cohort includes 46% of working women chemical engineers. But it contains only 14% of the men in the profession.
Top 10% of chemical engineers reach $100,000 salary after 20 years of work Years of professional experience Up to 5
11-15
16-20
21-25
25-30
31-35
36-40
More than 40
Overall median
Median base salarv (S thousands)
90th 75th 50th 25th 10th
$63.0 $75.0 $86.0 $97.8 $115.0 $140.0 $124.0 $148.0 $115.0 $105.0 98.1 85.0 52.0 65.0 75.4 86.3 96.9 111.0 106.5 113.2 68.2 45.5 56.4 66.6 76.0 79.5 82.3 90.0 89.8 87.8 39.5 50.3 58.3 61.2 54.0 65.1 69.0 74.0 73.3 75.5 33.7 45.7 51.2 57.8 51.2 44.0 61.3 64.9 66.3 63.0
Source: AlChE Salary Survey '96
72
SEPTEMBER 23, 1996 C&EN
Male
Female
Median base salary ($ thousands)
B.A. M.S. M.B.A. Ph.D. Total sample
$62.0 $65.0 $48.4 70.0 72.0 53.1 77.0 77.8 65.0 76.9 77.7 65.0 68.2 78.2 51.9
Source: AlChE Salary Survey '96
On average, women chemical engineers responding to AIChE's survey are about 10 years younger than the men responding. For male chemical engineers, this additional 10 years of service translates into a more than $20,000 boost in median salary—from $46,000 for those with up to five years of service to $67,000 for those with 11 to 15 years. By primary work function, 17.2% of those responding to AIChE's survey are in process engineering, with a median salary of $63,600. The next largest group, 15.8%, are in R&D. They have a median salary of $68,800. The third group, the 8.5% in environmental engineering, are the lowest paid, with a median salary of $57,100. The 2.1% of respondents in education and paid on a 12-month basis earn a median salary of $91,000. Those on nine-month contracts, 2.5%, earn $66,300.
Chem engineers' pay rises with supervisory r o l e . . . Median base salary ($ thousands)
No regular supervisory duties Indirect or staff supervision Supervise project or section Supervise team unit Manage department, division Owner or partner General management
$60.4 62.4 70.3 70.7 86.8 87.8 115.0
. . . and size of employer Number of employees
1-199 200-499 500-999 1,000-4,999 5,000 or more Source: AlChE Salary Survey '96
$61.6 63.5 67.0 69.0 73.2
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