Question: What is your salary for your job?

Artem Evdokimov answered on 20 Jun 2012:

The salary for a biological scientist depends on experience, place of employment (that is which country and city they are employed at) and the kind of work they’re doing. In Academia salaries start out low, and budding professors often have to supplement their earnings with grant money. In Industry salaries are a bit higher but also the potential for job loss is higher. Notably, this varies greatly from country to country – labor laws in the UK are nothing like labor laws in the USA for instance.

I am most familiar with salary ranges for biological/chemical scientists in the US. Please note that my numbers are very general and are likely to be inaccurate 🙂

Postdocs make anywhere between $25K and $45K, a new professor may hope for $45-65K and an experienced & tenured professor might be able to get ~$100K with grant support. In industry a B.Sc. employee may hope for $40-50K and M.Sc. for $45-75, which overlaps with an entry-level Ph.D. which would span the $65-85K range. An experienced PhD might get $80-100K depending on number of years on the job and on other factors. Bigger salaries usually correspond to some degree of managerial responsibility (which also implies larger risk since often the salary is tied with the group’s performance).

While this sounds ‘high’ please note that to get to the $100K boundary one has to attend ~13-15 years of school, and then spend another ~8-10 years working.