Our overall rankings are based on all alumni from each school, but when we determine best-value colleges by major, we only use salary data from alumni who graduate from with a particular major. Since majors impact future salary even more than school type, you can find out which schools produce the most financially successful graduates in the major grouping you are interested in, narrowing the field even more.
Payscale only includes schools for which we have enough data from alumni with that major for each major list. This means that our lists are not comprehensive – schools not listed on each ranking may offer that major, but we were not able to collect a statistically significant data pool to include it.
Our breakdowns of college return on investment by major can help you get an idea of how alumni who earned a bachelor’s degree only in the specific major you are interested in fare at different schools. For example, if you really want to major in art history, start by considering those schools where we know that humanities majors go on to earn a decent ROI, because it means that those alumni find jobs that pay well. Knowing how much alumni with your desired major earn over 20 years will also help you figure out how much you can afford to pay for college or take out in loans. Going into debt for an engineering degree isn’t a bad idea since most engineering grads see high ROIs. However, if you are considering a degree in the arts, you might want to be conservative with how much debt you take on, since the resulting ROIs for art majors are much lower overall.
There are not good majors or bad majors. STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) majors do tend to earn more on average, but there are plenty of schools with high ROIs for alumni who study the humanities and the arts. Just make a smart investment and think about college in terms of cost and future earning potential keeping in mind that not everyone even gets a job in the field where they majored.
Payscale was able to collect data on colleges based on the following major groupings:
Art Majors: Drama, music, industrial design, graphic design, fine arts, etc.
Business Majors: Business, marketing, finance, accounting, etc.
Computer Science Majors: Computer science, computer engineering, as well as math, statistics, etc.
Economics Majors: Economics, micro-economics, macro-economics
Education Majors: Education, elementary education, special education, etc.
Engineering Majors: Mechanical engineering, electrical engineering, chemical engineering, petroleum engineering, civil engineering, etc.
Humanities Majors: English language and literature, philosophy, foreign languages, history, minority studies, gender studies, etc.
Nursing Majors: Nursing, practical nursing, nursing administration, etc.
Philosophy and Religious Majors: Religion, theology, philosophy, Christian studies, etc.
Political Science Majors: Government, political science, history, etc.
Psychology Majors: Comparative psychology, social psychology, clinical psychology, forensic psychology, etc.
Science Majors: Biology, chemistry, geology, archaeology, microbiology, etc.
Social Work and Criminal Justice Majors: Social work, public administration, criminal justice administration, etc.
