The economic return of graduate degrees varies across fields, with professional degrees in medicine and pharmacy delivering some of the highest gains, according to a report published in March.
The analysis draws on administrative data from the Texas Education Research Center to estimate labor market returns for 121 advanced degrees. It was conducted by Joseph Altonji, PhD, an economics professor at Yale University in New Haven, Conn., and a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research, and Zhengren Zhu, PhD, an assistant professor of economics at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, N.Y.
Across all programs, graduate degrees increase earnings by about 17% on average, though returns vary significantly by field. Accounting for tuition costs and foregone earnings while enrolled reduces the increase in total lifetime income relative to earnings gains, in some cases substantially.
Returns also differ by student and program characteristics. Earnings gains tend to be higher for women, higher for students coming from lower-paying undergraduate majors and lower for part-time students.
Here are the cost-adjusted returns among 18 of the most common graduate degrees, according to the authors:
- MD: 173%
- PharmD: 68%
- JD: 41%
- MPA: 26%
- Civil engineering: 19%
- Biology: 14%
- MBA: 13%
- Nursing: 12%
- Education administration: 8%
- Computer science: 6%
- Electrical engineering: 4%
- Mechanical engineering: 4%
- Architecture: 4%
- Computer engineering: 2%
- Curriculum and instruction: -2%
- Social work: -2%
- Clinical psychology: -5%
- Psychology: -8%
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