>>12148575I graduated from a masters in chemistry this year (UK) and had a job lined up straight out of university thanks to internships. Others might not be so lucky, but job prospects are there.
Of course there's a really wide range of specialties, I went into organic chemistry and got a job as a medicinal research chemist, job prospects might be different for other disciplines.
Pay-wise it's not bad, not great. As a graduate chemist my wage is about in line with the lower end of what most graduate engineers seem to earn. Exactly how well the pay increases as I go on I'm not sure. Regardless it's not a bad wage, but if you're just in it for the money there's better things you could be doing to meet that end.
Personally I really enjoy the work. There's not much I'd rather be doing for a job than working in organic synthesis. I simply enjoy working in the lab, all the problem solving that goes with it. It's an engaging job and is far easier to get up to every morning than a monotonous grind behind a desk or whatever. Of course, that's my own opinion and you probably won't really know if you enjoy that kind of work until you do it.
Overall, not a meme degree. There's better choices of degree for job prospects and high pay, but if you have a passion and aptitude for the subject then it's a path worth following.
Also, even if you just do a BSc and crash out then the degree is still fairly well regarded and lots of people use it to get unrelated jobs such as accounting or whatever.
