Young people can earn some enviable salaries very early in their careers, especially if they enter the lucrative tech sector. Comparably, an organization that monitors the job market for trends in careers and compensation, recently studied thousands of salary records for workers aged 18-24.
Recent grads who studied computer science, business or design landed the top paying tech gigs. The two highest-paying jobs – senior developer and lead engineer – required workers to have some work experience and leadership skills. However, this does not preclude new grads or younger workers from being hired for these jobs. New graduates can already have up to four years of work experience through internships, working through school, or their own projects.
The data also revealed that interpersonal skills and communication skills were emphasized along with tech skills for the business-related positions.
Top tech jobs for grads
Ranked highest to lowest based on the average annual salary.
1. Senior developer $105,957 [Senior Developer jobs on CareerBeacon]
2. Lead engineer $103,237 [Lead engineer job postings]
3. Mobile developer $92,654 [See jobs for mobile developers]
4. Data scientist $88,813 [Positions for Data Scientist]
5. Product manager $87,947 [Job openings for project managers]
6. DevOps engineer $86,094 [DevOps positions available now]
7. UI/UX designer $71,691 [User Experience jobs on CareerBeacon]
8. Business development manager $68,588 [Business Development jobs]
9. Marketing manager $67,687 [Marketing manager positions available]
10. Business analyst $67,364 [Job ads for Business analysts]
11. QA analyst $66,358 [Quality assurance job openings]
12. Financial analyst $65,687 [Financial analyst job openings]
13. Operations manager $64,608 [Job postings for operations managers]
14. Web/Visual designer $64,478 [Web designer jobs hiring now]
15. Sales manager $64,412 [Companies hiring sales managers on CareerBeacon]
Salary diversity
Interestingly, the data crunchers at Comparably also analysed the salaries paid to men and women. It turns out that women are being paid more on average than their male counterparts for eight out of the 14 jobs included in the study.
Note: A large part of the money paid for some jobs, such as sales manager and business development manager, comes from commissions and bonuses, which were not factored into the base salaries listed here.
Ratings were derived from the average salary records of roughly 3,000 employees in tech jobs.
See more jobs in the red hot technology sector on CareerBeacon. View the full report from Comparably.