Profile of Today's College Graduates

The latest issue of the National Commission on Entrepreneurship's E-News brought our attention to survey results revealing that, despite the media and Wall Street attention given to dot-coms, only 13.1 percent of recent college graduates would like to work for the start-up, Internet-based businesses given a choice. Fortune 500 companies were the preferred choice for 42.2 percent of the survey respondents, while 24.7 percent opted for small businesses (specifically not dot-coms). One-in-five respondents wanted to work for their own companies. Released in June, the survey was conducted by the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE). 

NACE also released their annual salary survey for new college graduates in July. The results show starting salaries climbing for most disciplines -- not just the technical degrees. Top starting salary honors continue to go to pharmaceutical and engineering degrees but double-digit increases over last year were found for English majors (10.5 percent) and even political science grads (11.8 percent). 

It's fortunate that today's graduates are finding such good paying jobs -- because they need them: NACE also found that on top of student loans and car payments, more than half of recent grads already had credit card debt in excess of $3,000. Twenty-two percent owed more than $7,500 to credit card companies.