Notice anything about the green bars in the graphic at right? What caught our eye was the huge bar for "Nuclear power tech" in Texas. So what's the story? Is everything bigger in Texas? The graphic appeared in the Wall Street Journal on June 24 in an article on the value of two-year and four-year college degrees. Authors Mark Peters and Douglas Belkin cited recent studies by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and the American Institutes for Research . The green bar that caught our eye is based on data presented in the AIR report. It shows the first-year earnings of graduates of Associate's degree programs in nuclear technology in Texas as averaging more than $98,000. The report is not clear about the specific jobs tied to the reported first-year earnings by nuclear technology graduates in Texas. (There are two nuclear power plants in Texas : Comanche Peak in Glen Rose , and South Texas Project in Bay City , offering thousands of well paying jobs.)
Former blog for NEI featuring news and commentary on the commercial nuclear energy industry. Head to NEI.org for the latest blog posts.