The lofty rigour of English literature may not traditionally be viewed as a ‘Mickey Mouse’ degree. But it is one of the worst courses for graduate earning power and value for money.
New research has revealed the ten degrees that are the worst value for money, with those on the lowest-ranking course making an average of £24,785 five years after graduation.
The average university degree leaves graduates with £45,000 in debt, which they only start paying off when their salary exceeds £27,295.
But even after five years, those who studied English literature will only be earning an average salary of £26,169, according to job search engine Adzuna. This means they will not yet be paying off their debt five years after graduating.
Adzuna analysed more than 120,000 CVs to find the jobs that graduates are working in five years after leaving university. It then matched these with average salaries.
The research revealed that photography degrees offer the worst value for money, as graduates earn an average salary of £24,785 five years after graduation. It was followed by courses in translation (£24,815), film (£24,851), and fine art (£24,999).
Roughly 40pc of university degrees do not lead to an average salary above £30,000 within five years, the analysis found. Of the 74 degrees included, 14 did not exceed the student loan repayment threshold within that period.
‘I don’t feel like the course was worth it’
For 25-year-old Ben Ferris, who studied events management, his low salary has made him question whether the course was worth the money. He still earns less than £19,000 a year, despite graduating four years ago.
“The experience itself was amazing but I’ve been stuck in the ‘you haven’t got enough experience’ rut for jobs, even though I literally studied events management and put on events, so I feel like I could have probably done it off my own steam.
“For the wages that I’m on at the moment, I don’t feel like the course was worth it. But I don’t have to pay the loan back so I don’t really think about it that much.”
However, some have bucked this trend. Alice Oram, 27, studied film at Norwich University of the Arts, after which her starting job paid £23,000 a year. She said it took her several years to crack £30,000 working in documentary-making, taking on long hours as a runner which she said “killed any social life”.
She added: “I worked my way up from £25,000 to £36,000 over the years until I finally made my way up the ranks to junior assistant producer, which now gets me approximately £46,000. I’m a freelancer now so each time I take on a new job I bump up my pay rate slightly.”
English graduate Abbie Johnson currently earns a salary of £27,000 two years after finishing her MA, having started on £18,000 after graduating in 2018.
Like many English graduates, Ms Johnson works in marketing but said the chance to use her degree was worth the salary.
“There are times when you think it would have been good to come out of doing a law degree, for example, and heading into high pay, but I think it’s all relative,” she said. “University allowed me to see that there’s more to money when it comes to a career.”
I think what a lot students don’t realise is that degrees aren’t magic golden tickets to an instantly high paying job, they are just help. Then they’ll wonder why they aren’t on £50k+ p/a a year, less than a year after they graduate at 22.
Experience and working your way up are the main factors.
Before we get the inevitable “not everything is about money, education has its own value” knee-jerk
* no, money isn’t everything, but it’s certainly important. If it wasn’t, we wouldn’t be seeing strikes and complaints about the cost of living. If I’m studying for 3 years and incurring 30k of debt, I want to be earning more than 20k a year by the time I hit 27.
* many students don’t care deeply about their subject. Lecture halls are often half empty, especially in first year. If students are going to pick anything just for the sake of it at age 18, it would be better that it was a subject that enabled them to get a good job afterwards.
* we have too much emphasis on high-ranking unis and not enough on subjects. You would be better off studying Quantity Surveying at Liverpool John Moores than English at Uni. of Liverpool if career prospects are important to you.
Worst one I saw was BA (Hons) Furniture Studies.
Though I’d honestly consider History to be one too…
Boomers: I can study what I want and get paid for it!
Boomers 40 years later: you can’t just *study anything you want*, it’s a waste of money!
OP: absolutely. First thing I did after graduating (in English from a Russell Gp univ) was go back to a basic college and get some business training.
I have a degree in Games Computing. Was it worth ~£25k? Not sure, but it did teach me self confidence and how to write a bit better.
I work as a CAD draughtsman.
>But even after five years, those who studied English literature will only be earning an average salary of £26,169, according to job search engine Adzuna. This means they will not yet be paying off their debt five years after graduating.
>
>Adzuna analysed more than 120,000 CVs to find the jobs that graduates are working in five years after leaving university. It then matched these with average salaries.
I’ll be honest, this doesn’t seem very academic to me. It just reads more like hate wank bait for the Telegraph’s base.
If salary 5 years after graduation is the only factor being considered, I’m surprised Architecture isn’t on the list. If an Architect graduates at the fastest possible pace ( 5 year degree and a few years in £20-25k pa “trainee” positions in London), my little spreadsheet of average earnings suggest that someone working in Lidl for £18k pa since 18 years old will have a higher life-time earnings until the Architect is circa. Age 33!
I’m not able to view the whole article but I’d assume some of the degrees mentioned also have a slow ramp up in earnings??
I couldn’t read the article, but my daughter has just finished uni. While people snub the idea, I didn’t want my daughter to stay in a small town and end up in a dead end job. She is getting interviews for a junior artworker and while it is a starting salary of 21k, it’s still been worth her going and spreading her wings.
Just because you can earn more money working straight from school doesn’t mean that’s a good idea. I left school with a decent set of gcses having later flunked my a levels. My chances really were grim. It’s taken me years to get a decent salary, not having a degree has really hindered the places I could work and what I could earn. People might not think that degrees matter, but I wish I’d had the chance to go. It does make a difference. Even if it doesn’t straight away it can give you other opportunities. It really isn’t just about what you can earn.
Do they know how much Mickey Mouse is worth?
Although not a Mickey Mouse degree, it’s tricky to get anywhere with a music degree unless you go into teaching (or of course, playing). I know people who took the engineering pathway in music tech who got into audiology and other science roots, trickier to do with the BA.
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Author: Tom Haynes
The lofty rigour of English literature may not traditionally be viewed as a ‘Mickey Mouse’ degree. But it is one of the worst courses for graduate earning power and value for money.
New research has revealed the ten degrees that are the worst value for money, with those on the lowest-ranking course making an average of £24,785 five years after graduation.
The average university degree leaves graduates with £45,000 in debt, which they only start paying off when their salary exceeds £27,295.
But even after five years, those who studied English literature will only be earning an average salary of £26,169, according to job search engine Adzuna. This means they will not yet be paying off their debt five years after graduating.
Adzuna analysed more than 120,000 CVs to find the jobs that graduates are working in five years after leaving university. It then matched these with average salaries.
The research revealed that photography degrees offer the worst value for money, as graduates earn an average salary of £24,785 five years after graduation. It was followed by courses in translation (£24,815), film (£24,851), and fine art (£24,999).
Roughly 40pc of university degrees do not lead to an average salary above £30,000 within five years, the analysis found. Of the 74 degrees included, 14 did not exceed the student loan repayment threshold within that period.
‘I don’t feel like the course was worth it’
For 25-year-old Ben Ferris, who studied events management, his low salary has made him question whether the course was worth the money. He still earns less than £19,000 a year, despite graduating four years ago.
“The experience itself was amazing but I’ve been stuck in the ‘you haven’t got enough experience’ rut for jobs, even though I literally studied events management and put on events, so I feel like I could have probably done it off my own steam.
“For the wages that I’m on at the moment, I don’t feel like the course was worth it. But I don’t have to pay the loan back so I don’t really think about it that much.”
However, some have bucked this trend. Alice Oram, 27, studied film at Norwich University of the Arts, after which her starting job paid £23,000 a year. She said it took her several years to crack £30,000 working in documentary-making, taking on long hours as a runner which she said “killed any social life”.
She added: “I worked my way up from £25,000 to £36,000 over the years until I finally made my way up the ranks to junior assistant producer, which now gets me approximately £46,000. I’m a freelancer now so each time I take on a new job I bump up my pay rate slightly.”
English graduate Abbie Johnson currently earns a salary of £27,000 two years after finishing her MA, having started on £18,000 after graduating in 2018.
Like many English graduates, Ms Johnson works in marketing but said the chance to use her degree was worth the salary.
“There are times when you think it would have been good to come out of doing a law degree, for example, and heading into high pay, but I think it’s all relative,” she said. “University allowed me to see that there’s more to money when it comes to a career.”
I think what a lot students don’t realise is that degrees aren’t magic golden tickets to an instantly high paying job, they are just help. Then they’ll wonder why they aren’t on £50k+ p/a a year, less than a year after they graduate at 22.
Experience and working your way up are the main factors.
Before we get the inevitable “not everything is about money, education has its own value” knee-jerk
* no, money isn’t everything, but it’s certainly important. If it wasn’t, we wouldn’t be seeing strikes and complaints about the cost of living. If I’m studying for 3 years and incurring 30k of debt, I want to be earning more than 20k a year by the time I hit 27.
* many students don’t care deeply about their subject. Lecture halls are often half empty, especially in first year. If students are going to pick anything just for the sake of it at age 18, it would be better that it was a subject that enabled them to get a good job afterwards.
* we have too much emphasis on high-ranking unis and not enough on subjects. You would be better off studying Quantity Surveying at Liverpool John Moores than English at Uni. of Liverpool if career prospects are important to you.
Worst one I saw was BA (Hons) Furniture Studies.
Though I’d honestly consider History to be one too…
Boomers: I can study what I want and get paid for it!
Boomers 40 years later: you can’t just *study anything you want*, it’s a waste of money!
OP: absolutely. First thing I did after graduating (in English from a Russell Gp univ) was go back to a basic college and get some business training.
I have a degree in Games Computing. Was it worth ~£25k? Not sure, but it did teach me self confidence and how to write a bit better.
I work as a CAD draughtsman.
>But even after five years, those who studied English literature will only be earning an average salary of £26,169, according to job search engine Adzuna. This means they will not yet be paying off their debt five years after graduating.
>
>Adzuna analysed more than 120,000 CVs to find the jobs that graduates are working in five years after leaving university. It then matched these with average salaries.
I’ll be honest, this doesn’t seem very academic to me. It just reads more like hate wank bait for the Telegraph’s base.
Paywall mirror: http://www.archive.is/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/consumer-affairs/mickey-mouse-degrees-worst-value-money/
If salary 5 years after graduation is the only factor being considered, I’m surprised Architecture isn’t on the list. If an Architect graduates at the fastest possible pace ( 5 year degree and a few years in £20-25k pa “trainee” positions in London), my little spreadsheet of average earnings suggest that someone working in Lidl for £18k pa since 18 years old will have a higher life-time earnings until the Architect is circa. Age 33!
I’m not able to view the whole article but I’d assume some of the degrees mentioned also have a slow ramp up in earnings??
**Best analysis on the topic:** [https://www.economist.com/britain/2017/08/12/which-british-universities-do-most-to-boost-graduate-salaries](https://www.economist.com/britain/2017/08/12/which-british-universities-do-most-to-boost-graduate-salaries)
University of Portsmouth is the best nationally for IMPROVING your salary based on your projected earnings based on entry points.
Data and methodology attached here: [https://ibb.co/album/r3R0NG?sort=date_asc&page=1](https://ibb.co/album/r3R0NG?sort=date_asc&page=1)
I couldn’t read the article, but my daughter has just finished uni. While people snub the idea, I didn’t want my daughter to stay in a small town and end up in a dead end job. She is getting interviews for a junior artworker and while it is a starting salary of 21k, it’s still been worth her going and spreading her wings.
Just because you can earn more money working straight from school doesn’t mean that’s a good idea. I left school with a decent set of gcses having later flunked my a levels. My chances really were grim. It’s taken me years to get a decent salary, not having a degree has really hindered the places I could work and what I could earn. People might not think that degrees matter, but I wish I’d had the chance to go. It does make a difference. Even if it doesn’t straight away it can give you other opportunities. It really isn’t just about what you can earn.
Do they know how much Mickey Mouse is worth?
Although not a Mickey Mouse degree, it’s tricky to get anywhere with a music degree unless you go into teaching (or of course, playing). I know people who took the engineering pathway in music tech who got into audiology and other science roots, trickier to do with the BA.