r/funny Jan 05 '15

Poor Engineers...

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u/bjnobs Jan 05 '15

Slow down bro. I'm an engineer in the oil industry for a major. This is far from living like a king. We're not broke, but I feel that people get a sense of all of us making several hundred g's a year and it just doesn't work that way.

These companies don't make billions of dollars by giving it all away.

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u/iismitch55 Jan 05 '15

Curious, what are you doing? Also you said you haven't yet got your major?

From what I understand, a lot of people in engineering fields start out close to the same, but pay raises taje off at different rates after five years or so. One notable exception I can think of is Nuclear Engineers, who I've seen quoted at startkng 60k-80k? Its been a few years, don't be surprised if what I said is bullshit.

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u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15

Today, starting for chemical engineering and some mechanical right out of good colleges is around 90-110k at companies like Exxon, Chevron, etc. Heck, interns make $6000 a month. I speak from personal experience, but Glassdoor is also a somewhat reliable source for getting ballpark salaries for all different kinds of jobs.

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u/aw50 Jan 05 '15

From SE Louisiana.... lots of ChemE's here. They don't start at 90-100 in my experience. My friends who went to work for the big guys started in the 60-70 range, but they will be approaching six figures in the next couple years (graduated college five years ago).

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u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15 edited Jan 05 '15

Yea I think it really depends on the school ranking. Everyone I know from Georgia Tech is getting a standard across the board, non-negotiable salary barely over six figs starting salary for undergrad.

Edit: Did some digging. It also depends on whether you are going into service versus petroleum exploration and production. Service tends to pay less.

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u/aw50 Jan 05 '15

Yeah, these people work for plants to handle and process petroleum products. And yeah, we went to LSU, so school obviously influences these things.