<p>I think the OP raises a good point, though. There are many paths to a middle class standard of living that do not require college. </p>
<p>
If the median is 50k, then half the class is earning less than that. How many families take out big loans for a name-brand school for an early childhood education degree?</p>
<p>Life isn’t about how much money you make, although it seems like that sentiment is becoming more prevalent.</p>
<p>Money doesn’t buy happiness, but it sure allows you to look for it in a lot more places.</p>
<p>There’s actually a pretty strong correlation between income and happiness:
<a href=“http://freakonomics.com/2008/04/22/the-economics-of-happiness-part-4-are-rich-people-happier-than-poor-people/”>http://freakonomics.com/2008/04/22/the-economics-of-happiness-part-4-are-rich-people-happier-than-poor-people/</a></p>
<p>William Hill: If you are really interested in this, take a look at this NY Times website piece from 2009: <a href=“http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/20/do-elite-colleges-produce-the-best-paid-graduates/[/url]”>http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/20/do-elite-colleges-produce-the-best-paid-graduates/</a></p>
<p>Note that 5 years ago, the median Harvard salary for mid-career alumni – what would be equivalent to your $91,000 median salary for New Jersey police officers – was about $125,000. Even if we ignore any wage increases in the past 5 years (and on a macro level wages have not increased much over that period), that’s a pretty hefty difference. It also shows that the median starting salary for new Harvard grads 5 years ago was about $60,000, which is a lot more than median starting salary for New Jersey police officers.</p>
<p>What’s more, the two figures are not really comparable. All police officers are pretty much police officers, but Harvard graduates do all kinds of things, some of which have absolutely terrible starting pay (like being an actor, a writer, or an artist, working with public health NGOs in Africa, or working in a biology research lab while you do your medical school applications), and some of which have obscene starting pay (like working for a large management consulting firm). No starting NJ police officer was making more than 5% more or less than the median, and no experienced NJ police officer was making much more than 200% of the median, or much less than 75% of it. With new Harvard grads, some were already making almost 200% of the median, and some probably less than half, and with experienced Harvard alumni quite a few may have been making 10, 20, 100 times the median. The average annual salary of the Harvard group would be much, much higher than the average annual salary of the police officers, by far more than the $35,000 difference in the medians.</p>
<p>Also, the Harvard data tend to be a little misleading, because they exclude any Harvard graduates with advanced degrees, which – hello! – means at least 80% of Harvard graduates. (Of all the people I knew at my Harvard-like college, the only people who never picked up advanced degrees were a few journalists and writers, some stock traders, and people who went into businesses their family owned. Plus one real estate developer.) The median salary data come from only a small, unrepresentative sampling of each Harvard cohort. </p>
<p>JHS - Good stuff, makes sense. The way I see it is $91k (+ overtime pay) is a lot. It’s more than a lot of managers with MBAs at big corporations make. </p>
<p>Political friends = trump a lot of things. In other words, things that shouldn’t be can happen when you put politicians in the mix. </p>
<p>OP what you fail to realize is the incredible growth potential for wealth and assets of a Harvard graduate who wishes to earn as much money as he/she can (which most don’t)</p>
<p>Let’s take this data (remembering of course that graduating from Harvard positions one best to enter competitive fields such as Private Equity):
Private Equity Compensation:
Analyst/Associate - First Year: $130K - $ 250K
Analyst/Associate - Second Year: $150K - $ 300K
Analyst/Associate - Third Year +: $170 K - $ 350K
Vice Presidents: $300K - $ 800K
Managing Directors/Partners: $ 500K - $ 10MM+</p>
<p>First of all, let’s take note that upon entering the job market Harvard graduates have the opportunity to be making well over the top compensation earned by police officers throughout their entire careers. This immediately refutes your point, but I will continue nonetheless.</p>
<p>We will use the compound interest approach to take a look at some of the growth potential:
Fn=Fn-1(1+i)</p>
<p>So, if it costs $31,000 a year to live in NYC then you are left with $159,000 (assuming you were at $191,000 (the median compensation for first year analyst). Assuming a 7% return on your various investments (which should theoretically be higher if you work in finance) and that you invest $140,000 of your money:</p>
<p>Fn1=140,000(1+0.07)
Fn1=149,800</p>
<p>Now let’s say it takes you 3 years to go from Third Year analyst to VP and another 5 years to go to Partner:</p>
<p>Fn2=175,000(1.07)
Fn2=187,250
Fn3=210,000(1.07)
Fn3=224,700
Fn4=Fn3(1.07)=240,429
Fn5=Fn4(1.07)=257,259
Fn6=Fn5(1.07)=275,267
Fn7=500,000(1.07)=535,000
Fn8=Fn7(1.07)=572,450
Fn9=Fn8(1.07)=612,521
Fn10=Fn9(1.07)=655,398
Fn11=Fn10(1.07)=701,275
Fn12=5,200,000(1.07)=5,564,000</p>
<p>sum(Fn1-Fn12)=9,975,349</p>
<p>$9,975,349 in 12 years is a whole lot more than a police officer makes and it will only grow exponentially from there.</p>
<p>Now through all of this I made tons of assumptions and this is clearly extremely simplified, but the point is a Harvard grad can easily make so much more than a cop and it is ridiculous to compare them. That being said, there is nothing wrong with not going to college, but your assertion is wrong if the Harvard grad wishes it to be.</p>
<p>Different people have different dreams. Obama’s wage is not that high either compared to other Harvard grads. He became the president because he wanted to make a change. Students attend university because they enjoy learning not because to make money. Okay most of them do. But there are people who attend university to learn knowledge that can truly change the world in amazing ways. For example, Annan, Ban Ki Moon, Obama, Bill Gates, and many others. Some of them don’t make a lot but money is not important to them. The happiness and well being of others in the world is what is the most important to those people. They are not merely satisfied with catching criminals in one city and make the lives of citizens in City X better, they want to make the entire world better. </p>
<p>Even though the world revolves around money, peoples’ consciousness doesn’t. </p>
<p>Wow, that is pretty good statement. If I become famous, I will use that as my motto :)</p>
<p>Boom boom- you’re right if they get into private equity, but that’s not what the salary averages show happen. Do that analysis with the population being the entire class. Then the comparison to NJ cops salary ($91k plus $20k overtime average) is suprisingly feasible.</p>
<p>I think a better argument is not money, but access to a lot opportunities in different fields…</p>
<p>My dad was a cop in Oakland, CA. From anecdotal evidence (not my dad), I would say that many cops are not especially happy people and that being a cop places a lot of strain on marriages. </p>
<p>Entrebusecon makes some faulty assumptions. Not all Harvard grads can land a $191k job, it’s pretty tough to live in NYC on $31,000/yr., and there’s this pesky thing called income tax.</p>
<p>@sherpa Of course I made assumptions, but you get the point.</p>
<p>@WilliamHill I’m saying if money is what matters to you, going to Harvard is soooo much better than being a policeman. Sure you can max out at $110,000 a year as a cop, but you can make millions upon millions as a Harvard grad if you work for it. Think about it, going into IB or PE or VC or Hedge Funds or whatever can pay more than a cop makes at the top of his salary range in your FIRST YEAR. Or, if you are not so shallow about money you could do something you love or try and change the world etc. which may have less immediate monetary compensation, but far more value. </p>
<p>Entre- valid point. Btw- $91k is the average not the max.</p>
<p>$91K is not the average, it’s the median. It’s probably fairly close to the average, though, because police salaries are packed into a pretty tight range. There isn’t any group at the top of the pyramid making $20 million per year for being police chiefs, and no one makes less than the ~$40,000 starting salary. Whereas for Harvard graduates the range is enormous, from less than $40,000 to, probably, $100 million or more for hedge fund types. So the average is going to be way higher than the median.</p>
<p>(Also – why do you keep saying $91,000 plus overtime? Doesn’t the $91,000 figure include overtime? Compensation figures are usually based on total compensation, not base salary.)</p>
<p>One other point worth discussing: It’s wrong to treat police work as if it were some sort of unskilled labor. In addition to being dangerous, police work requires a lot of skill, intelligence, judgment, and training. Because the jobs are well-paid and socially respected, they are very competitive to get. The people hired usually have prior training and experience, often in the military, and they have usually come out on top on pretty tough qualification tests, both verbal/intellectual and physical. There may not be lot of Harvard grads on police forces in New Jersey, but I would bet most of the officers have college degrees. It’s really not so surprising that police officers are well paid.</p>