SA degrees with the highest starting salaries

 ·13 Sep 2015

MyBroadband’s recent qualifications and salary survey reveals that Engineering graduates enjoy the highest starting salaries, followed by BEd and BSc graduates.

The survey was completed 4,638 South Africans, of which 1,787 did a degree at a traditional South African university.

To rank the starting salaries of graduates, we only considered people who started working from 2013 onward.

The different degrees were then grouped together – like BA, BSc, or Engineering – and the average starting salary for each group was calculated.

No distinction was made between the degree levels – standard degrees, Honours, Master’s, and Doctorate qualifications were grouped together.

Highest starting salaries

Engineering graduates had the highest average starting salary, R19,069 per month, followed by BEd graduates at R15,825, and general BSc graduates at R14,541.

The infographic below provides a quick overview of the average salary per qualification.

Average starting salary per qualification

A comprehensive look at the results

To get a more detailed picture of the survey results, an engineer who is well versed in statistics assisted with some calculations.

The table below shows the average salary, median salary, and the 25th and 75th percentiles of starting salaries for recent graduates.

Starting salaries per qualification
Qualification Average starting salary Median starting salary* 25% quantile** 75% quantile***
BSc Engineering or BEng Degrees R19,069 R20,000 R15,000 R24,000
BEd Degrees R15,825 R16,000 R14,850 R16,787
General BSc Degrees R14,541 R12,000 R8,000 R20,250
BSc Computer Science or IT Degrees R14,452 R15,000 R8,000 R19,000
BTech Degrees R13,008 R11,500 R7,875 R14,500
BCom Degrees R11,070 R10,000 R8,000 R13,000
BA Degrees R9,534 R8,000 R6,875 R12,750
Diploma R6,814 R6,000 R4,000 R8,750
Matric R5,830 R4,975 R3,000 R6,500
Certification R5,777 R5,500 R3,000 R7,000

*Median – the salary which is in the middle of the set of starting salaries.

**25% quantile – the lowest starting salary that is greater than 25% of the salaries.

***75% quantile – the lowest starting salary that is greater than 75% of the salaries.

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Shocking state of teacher qualifications in SA

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