Employment, starting salaries, and educational indebtedness of year-2019 graduates of US veterinary medical colleges

Abstract

For year-2019 graduates of US veterinary medical schools and colleges who had accepted a full-time position in private, public, or corporate practice or an advanced education program (n = 2,375), mean starting annual salary was $70,045. Excluding salaries for individuals who were pursuing advanced education, mean starting annual salary for graduates who had accepted a full-time position in private, public, or corporate practice was $86,031. For the 2,720 year-2019 graduates who reported information on debt, mean educational debt accumulated during veterinary school was $149,877 (median, $156,597). Mean educational debt for the 2,224 (81.8%) year-2019 graduates who had educational debt was $183,302, compared with a mean of $183,014 for year-2018 graduates who had educational debt. (J Am Vet Med Assoc 2020;257:292-297).