IIT Placements: The Higher the Degree, the Lower the Salary! B.Tech graduates from IITs earn an average salary 30% higher than their M.Tech peers

Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) are a model of success and excellence in the country. They are also at the forefront of research, adding impetus to the startup culture in the country. For years, students have been aspiring to find a place in one of these top-tier technical institutions in the country, and rightly so. With some of the best placements in the country, students at IITs have long enjoyed an early ticket to professional and financial success. However, there seems to be one trend that is detrimental to the research ecosystem in the country: the paradox that the higher the degree, the lower the salary.

Popular wisdom might dictate that a higher degree would translate into a higher or better salary. After all, a higher degree would correspond to better subject knowledge as well as a broader set of skills in a specialized domain. However, as per the information released by the Ministry of Education, MoE for the ninth edition of the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF Rankings India 2024), the postgraduate degree from IITs is not as lucrative as an undergraduate degree.

IIT Placements:IIT engineering graduates earn an average of 30% more than postgraduate graduates

A tentative look at the average salary of graduate students who have completed a 4-year course at a Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the average salary of students who have done postgraduate studies at the same IIT shows strangely skewed data, showing a sharp decline.

A quick comparison of the average salary of undergraduate students with the average salary of postgraduate students shows a larger salary disparity that contradicts the basic idea. Think about this: the average salary of an IIT graduate ranges between 15 lakhs and 23 lakhs. In comparison, the average salary of a student who has done postgraduate studies from the same IIT ranges between 10 lakhs and 14 lakhs.

The disparity was greatest at IIT Indore where the median salary of college graduates stood at 21.20 lakhs while the median salary of non-college graduates was just 8 lakhs, a staggering 64% less than the salary of college graduates. Even for top IITs like the renowned Bombay Institute of Technology and Delhi Institute of TechnologyThe difference was 24 percent and 30 percent respectively.

And this is not just true for IITs, but is prevalent across all engineering colleges. The average salary of postgraduates, as per placement data shared for other non-IIT engineering colleges, is also valid. However, the only difference is that the pay gap is smaller. While on average an IIT postgraduate gets 30% less salary than an IIT graduate, in other top-tier engineering colleges the difference is between 10%-15%, but it is still smaller.

Interestingly, the higher the category of the institution, the greater the difference between average salaries, as graduates receive higher salaries than their superiors. However, what is worth mentioning is that an engineering graduate receives a higher average salary than a graduate from another branch.

A postgraduate from any discipline had a better educational package than an engineering postgraduate. The only professions that bucked the trend were medical professionals or management professionals. For management professionals, no data were available to compare the placements of MBA graduates and BA graduates.

*Please note that the comparison available is of median salary and not average salary. Also, the data is of placements at various IITs reported for NIRF 2024 rankings. This is not reflected in this year’s placements. Needless to say, students continue to get offers from top companies and earn good money. Also, the salaries received by IIT graduates, be it from undergraduate or postgraduate courses, continue to be among the highest in the industry.