<p>It seems that civil engineers make the least out of all the engineering majors. Is this true?</p>
<p>As far as I know, yes. The average civil engineer's salary is lower than the average of other engineers.</p>
<p>It is true.</p>
<p>I know they start lower but after a couple of years are they still at the lower end of the spectrum? Like once they have their PE?</p>
<p>thogh civil is the hottest type of engineeing right now, so there are many jobs.,</p>
<p>It really wouldn't matter to me if civil engineering did have the lowest pay among engineering majors if I really loved it. I guess some people do it just for the money.</p>
<p>so would you still do it if I were to pay you $10 a year. just because you love it</p>
<p>I never said money was not a factor. I said some people do it just for the money. Plus $10 a year is an unfair comparison, which job do you know of pays that? I also said "among engineering majors" and none of the engineering majors pay bad wages, all of them pay higher than most other non-engineering majors.</p>
<p>The starting salaries really shouldn't determine what career to go into.. I just don't think the difference is significant to justify it. None of the other fields ever interested me, so it really wouldn't matter to me even if the other salaries were two or three times as high. </p>
<p>Keep in mind that many civil engineers are employed by the government... perhaps 1 in 3. Though these people have great benefits, they have significantly lower salaries, so if you want to go into civil engineering and want lots of money, don't go into government!</p>
<p>The one good thing about civil engineering is that it is one of the more difficult fields to outsource work to other countries. Infrastructure and buildings projects will always require at least some people to be working locally. You can't exactly ship an office tower across the Pacific on a barge. Because of licensing requirements, there will always be a need for a PE in the state the project is located to sign off on everything. Engineers halfway around the world also can't walk a project site to perform inspections. Not to say foreign engineers will be completely shut out, but there will always be work here in the U.S.</p>
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It seems that civil engineers make the least out of all the engineering majors. Is this true?
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<p>Civil does make the lowest starting salary among the 'unspecialized' engineering disciplines. {For example, I suspect that CivE's make higher starting salaries than, say, agricultural engineers, but AgE's are rather specialized. It should also be pointed out that AgE's obviously tend to work in rural farming areas where the cost of living is relatively cheap}</p>
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As far as I know, yes. The average civil engineer's salary is lower than the average of other engineers.
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I know they start lower but after a couple of years are they still at the lower end of the spectrum? Like once they have their PE?
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<p>CivE's tend to catch up quickly such that the difference between experienced CivE's and ME's is small. </p>
<p><a href="http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos027.htm#earnings%5B/url%5D">http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos027.htm#earnings</a></p>
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thogh civil is the hottest type of engineeing right now, so there are many jobs.,
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<p>Well, I don't know about being 'the hottest'. BiomedE is significantly hotter. EnvironmentalE (which could be considered a subset of CivE) is also hotter.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos027.htm#outlook%5B/url%5D">http://www.bls.gov/oco/ocos027.htm#outlook</a></p>
<p>But I don't necessarily know that you always want to chase 'the hottest' field anyway. BiomedE is indeed extremely hot in terms of high percentage growth rates, but from a small initial base, so even rapid job growth is not going to translate into a large absolute number of jobs, and probably won't be enough to compensate for the large increase in interest in BioMed. In other words, I don't know that enough jobs are being created in BioMed to employ the surge of people who are getting BioMed degrees. What you really want to find is a field in which there is more demand than there is supply.</p>
<p>The pay in construction (working for a large contractor) is much higher than the average for civil. Many/most of these jobs are filled by other majors like Construction Management, etc..., but CE's are well sought after in the field. Part of the reason for this, in my opinion, is that the CE professors don't seem to know these jobs exist. </p>
<p>Four years down the road, CE's become even more valuable to the contractors because they can sit for the PE. (To do this and get the required experience, one must work for a contractor that already has a PE on staff.)</p>
<p>In my personal experience, having worked in both design and construction, I can draw 20-25% more salary in construction. This is at least on par with many other engineering disciplines.</p>
<p>Salaries for many CEs may be lower than in other engineering disciplines, but this is a trade-off that many CEs are perfectly willing to accept.</p>
<p>First, many CEs accept lower salaries in return for positions in federal, state, or local government. CEs are far more likely to work in the public sector than most other engineers. In this case, the enhanced job security and benefits may compensate for the lower salary.</p>
<p>Second, many CEs accept lower salaries in return for positions in smaller cities, towns, and rural areas. CEs have far more geographic flexibility than most other engineers. In this case, the lower cost of living may compensate for the lower salary.</p>
<p>There are CEs working for local public works departments who have relatively low salaries, but who also have secure jobs, big houses, and well-funded pension plans. There are engineers working in Silicon Valley who have the reverse.</p>
<p>I wouldn't say the reason fewer CE's work for construction managers and contractors is because professors don't know about these positions. I think it has more to do with people's personal preferences. Some don't like the idea of working in the field, sometimes in the hot summer heat, sometimes in the freezing cold. Some are concerned with prestige; they want to work in an office and wear a fancy suit 9-5, which you wouldn't get when you first start off in construction. </p>
<p>Many CE's want to do design work so it wouldn't make sense for them to go into this field. There's little to none of that in construction, and I think that's the major reason not as many people take this route. If you're a construction management major, you pretty much decided what kind of job you want from day one. As a CE, there are just so many things you can do: traffic, structural, geotechnical, water resources, and environmental in addition to construction.</p>
<p>Ken,
I agree will most of your post, but I would like to offer a few clarifications. First, none of my professors seemed to know about these jobs. I focused on structures in my BSCE and MSCE, so most of my profs steered us toward design firms. They did not seem to be aware that contractors employed engineers. Certainly if your professors are in the construction management side, they will be aware, but I think they are the exception in CE departments.</p>
<p>As to prestige and work conditions, what you say may be true in terms of student perception, but it is not always reality. For example, my first job after graduate school was for a contractor on a $600 million bridge project. This is probable the most prestigious job I will ever have since I have now moved to design. When I was on the bridge, everyone I knew was interested in and aware of what I was doing. The designer was a thousand miles away. I'm sure their friends could have cared less that they were designing some huge bridge half way across the country.</p>
<p>As to the working conditions, on this particular project there were roughly 40 engineers on site. Many of them, like me for example, worked inside most of the time doing calculations and logistical planning. You can get your hands dirty if you want to, but there is room for every type, including plenty of design work on the larger/heavy projects (I spent at least half my time designing crane platforms, etc...). </p>
<p>My whole point is that if the OP is after money, it is worthwhile to consider construction.</p>