A student choosing medicine can expect to earn up to £400,000 more over their lifetime than a non-graduate, new research from the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) reveals. Economics also delivers a significant financial boost. But for those studying creative arts, philosophy or languages, the return can be little or even negative compared with someone similar who never went to university.
The findings, based on a cohort of England-domiciled students born in the mid-1980s who sat their GCSEs in 2002, show that on average a graduate earns around £100,000 more across their working life – after taxes and student loan repayments have been taken into account. Yet the data also exposes a striking divide: a quarter of graduates will be financially worse off as a result of going to university. Among male graduates, one in ten can expect to be more than £90,000 worse off than they otherwise would have been.
“Medicine graduates can earn up to £400,000 more, but a quarter of students are worse off, IFS research finds.”
For students who stayed in education after 16 but had relatively low GCSE grades, attending university still lifts lifetime take-home pay by £53,000 on average compared with peers who had similar grades but did not go. However, around four in ten graduate men with low prior attainment will end up worse off financially than if they had skipped university entirely.
The government is taking note. The Department for Education (DfE) says it will cap numbers on courses with the poorest returns and will consult on introducing a minimum English language requirement for prospective undergraduates seeking student finance. A new consultation is due to begin in the autumn.
Minister for Skills Jacqui Smith urged students to think hard before committing to a degree. “Don’t walk into a degree by default,” she said. “Going to university and getting a degree is one of the most…”