# What do new college grads make these days? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 13, 2005, 4:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-new-college-grads-make-these-days/284505 "2005-01-13T04:38:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 2\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2005, 5:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-new-college-grads-make-these-days/284505/21 "2005-01-14T05:37:48Z")
Oops, I missed how garbled that last sentence was. Umm, I think you get the point though. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![nivlac](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/3bc359/32.png) [@nivlac](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nivlac)\ **Post date:** [January 14, 2005, 6:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-new-college-grads-make-these-days/284505/22 "2005-01-14T06:21:15Z")
> [@gobear](#): > > But what people are failing to take into account is that salaries reflect not only the demand for the skillset of the new grad, but also the buying power in the local economy. SF, for example, is a hideously expensive city, and according to the salary calculator on [Monster.com](http://Monster.com), $74,000 in the Bay Area is equivalent to $43,000 here in DC. Not bad for a new grad, but it’s not a lot of money for this area. I was just responding to the OP, not making any statement about what’s a good salary or not. As point of reference, according to the [CNNMoney Cost of Living Calculator](http://cgi.money.cnn.com/tools/costofliving/costofliving.html?step=form), $74K in SF is comparable to about $60.5K in DC. So a salary of $43K must mean that programmer supply is outstripping demand in the DC area. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-do-new-college-grads-make-these-days/284505.md?page=1)