Charted: After License Costs, Electricians Out-Earn Biology Majors by $12,800 at Year 10
Modeled experience paths from BLS OEWS, Georgetown CEW, and NY Fed labor dynamics: at 10 years on the job, electricians clear biology by about $12,800 gross — and roughly $17,800 once tuition and license costs are amortized.
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The college-or-trade debate usually compares starting pay or lifetime headlines. That framing hides the schedule that matters for a household budget: what you earn at the same number of years on the job, after the cost of getting in. License fees, tools, and apprenticeship dues are not free. Four years of net tuition are not free either. This desk puts both on the same clock.
Using BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) May 2024 medians for selected trades, Georgetown Center on Education and the Workforce (CEW) major-earnings tables for bachelor's holders, and early-career wage-growth patterns consistent with New York Fed labor-market dynamics research, we model annual wages at 0, 2, 5, 10, 15, and 20 years of experience. Upfront costs are amortized straight-line over ten years. The punchline is concrete: at ten years, an electrician's modeled path clears a biology bachelor's path by about $12,800 in gross wages — and about $17,800 once amortization is subtracted.
The comparison clock, not the prestige clock
Prestige rankings sort majors by mid-career medians. Licensing boards sort trades by exam pass rates. Neither answers the household question: if two people start working the same year, who is ahead after a decade?
OEWS gives a national occupational snapshot — electricians at a $62,350 median, plumbers at $61,550, HVAC technicians at $57,460, welders at $48,940 (May 2024). CEW tables give major-family medians for full-time workers whose highest degree is a bachelor's — mechanical engineering near $98,000 mid-career, nursing around $84,000, business around $72,000, biology around $67,000, psychology around $55,000, education around $52,000. Those are levels, not paths.
To put them on the same experience axis, we interpolate between OEWS entry and experienced percentiles for trades and between CEW early-career and mid-career cells for majors, then apply growth rates in the range reported by NY Fed equitable-growth / labor-dynamics work for early-career wage gains. The result is a desk model, not a longitudinal survey of the same people. It is designed to answer a schedule question with disclosed anchors.
Wage gap at 10 years: the headline pair
The cleanest contrast is electrician versus biology. Biology is a large STEM-adjacent major that often leads to lab, health-adjacent, or further-schooling tracks — not automatically to engineering pay. On our path:
- Year 0: electrician ~$42,800 vs biology ~$38,400 (+$4,400)
- Year 5: ~$60,100 vs ~$51,600 (+$8,500)
- Year 10: ~$71,200 vs ~$58,400 (+$12,800)
- Year 20: ~$84,900 vs ~$70,200 (+$14,700)
Psychology and education widen further. Against psychology at year 10 the electrician gap is about $19,100; against education, about $18,800. Business is closer: plumber versus business sits slightly underwater on gross wages at year 10 (−$2,300) before cost amortization flips the net comparison.
Mechanical engineering remains the counter-example that keeps the story honest. At year 10 the electrician trails mech-eng by roughly $27,000 gross. Nursing (BSN) also stays ahead of the trade median band. Trades do not "beat college." They beat specific bachelor's fields on a cost-adjusted experience clock.
What "after license costs" actually subtracts
Trades are not zero-cost. A realistic national midpoint for license, exam, tools, and early dues lands near $6,400–$9,200 depending on the craft — we use about $9,200 for electricians and $8,600 for plumbers. Straight-line over ten years, that is roughly $640–$920 per year.
Bachelor's net prices are an order of magnitude larger. College Board Trends in College Pricing 2024 implies a four-year public net tuition-fees-books path near $54,000–$64,000 for many students who receive aid but still pay substantial net costs. Amortized over ten years, that is about $5,400–$6,400 per year — a permanent drag on the early-career wage comparison even before student-loan interest.
Subtract those annual amortizations from year-10 wages and the electrician–biology gap rises from $12,800 to about $17,800. Plumber versus business flips from a small gross deficit to a modest net surplus. The amortization is deliberately simple: it is not a full NPV with discount rates, tax treatment, or living costs during school. It is a transparent way to stop pretending tuition is free.
| Track | Upfront cost | Wage @ 10y | Amort / yr | Net @ 10y |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Electrician | $9,200 | $71,200 | $920 | $70,280 |
| Plumber | $8,600 | $69,500 | $860 | $68,640 |
| HVAC tech | $7,800 | $65,100 | $780 | $64,320 |
| Welder | $6,400 | $56,400 | $640 | $55,760 |
| Mechanical eng. | $62,000 | $98,200 | $6,200 | $92,000 |
| Nursing (BSN) | $64,000 | $84,600 | $6,400 | $78,200 |
| Business | $56,000 | $71,800 | $5,600 | $66,200 |
| Biology | $58,000 | $58,400 | $5,800 | $52,600 |
| Psychology | $56,000 | $52,100 | $5,600 | $46,500 |
| Education | $54,000 | $52,400 | $5,400 | $47,000 |
Cumulative net earnings: when the paths cross
Annual gaps understate cash in the bank. Cumulating net wages from career start, the electrician path passes biology around year six on our schedule — earlier than the year-10 headline because biology's early wages are soft while the trade is already collecting journey-level pay. Psychology is passed even sooner. Mechanical engineering stays ahead throughout the twenty-year window; the area chart in the dashboard makes that hierarchy visible without slogans.
This cumulative view also clarifies apprenticeship: many trades earn during training, while many bachelor's paths defer full-time earnings. Our year-0 trade wages already reflect post-apprenticeship entry rather than unpaid classroom years. If anything, that convention is conservative against trades for students who forgo four years of full-time earnings.
Regional premiums change the edge, not the ranking
OEWS geographic profiles show Pacific and New England electricians well above the national median; East South Central sits below. Applying division-style premiums to both electrician and biology paths, the year-10 trade edge stays positive everywhere in our set — widest in East North Central (~$15,100) and narrowest in East South Central (~$10,400). High-cost coasts lift both tracks; they do not erase the biology gap. Local union scales, prevailing-wage rules, and hospital labor markets can rearrange individual metros — the national model is a baseline, not a zip-code forecast.
Caveats the dashboard cannot paper over
Several limits matter. First, composition: CEW major medians mix industries; OEWS trades mix residential and industrial employers. Second, hours and overtime: construction paychecks often embed overtime that salaried BA roles do not. Third, injury and cycle risk: trades carry higher physical risk and sharper downturn sensitivity than many office majors. Fourth, graduate school: biology and psychology paths frequently continue into advanced degrees that change both cost and earnings — our BA-only CEW perimeter excludes that upside (and that tuition). Fifth, amortization ignores interest, grants that reduce net price to near zero for some students, and employer-paid apprenticeship costs. Sixth, the experience paths are modeled, not person-level panel data; NY Fed dynamics inform growth rates, they do not identify each SOC–major pair.
None of those caveats reverse the narrow claim we are making: on a same-experience, cost-aware clock, licensed trades clear several large bachelor's fields by year ten — with a headline electrician–biology gross gap near $12,800 and a net gap near $17,800.
What the interactive panels show
The dashboard opens on wage paths for a selectable trade and major, with gross or net-of-cost toggles and an experience-year control. Gap ladder ranks trade-minus-major differences at the selected year. Cost scatter plots upfront training cost against net wage at year 10. Cumulative net shows the electrician crossover versus biology and the persistent engineering lead. Region edge applies OEWS-style premiums to the year-10 trade advantage.
Use the experience buttons to watch gaps open: many trade–major pairs look close at year 0 and decisive at year 10. That is the schedule the prestige debate usually skips.