There are count­less con­ver­sa­tions among archi­tects about pay, and how archi­tec­ture is (appar­ently) poorly paid. Now there’s some good proof. An awe­some online survey and search­able data­base was shown to me today, assem­bled by Coroflot. You can view the datasets here, sort by coun­try as well as occu­pa­tion and job title. The few graph­ics are great too. It isn’t sur­pris­ing that among the design pro­fes­sions (graphic, fash­ion, inter­ac­tive media, and so forth), archi­tec­ture has one of the lower ceilings.

Archinect has had a salary poll run­ning for quite some time, and it has always been a fas­ci­nat­ing read. But it has always been incom­plete, has no sortable data­bases, and didn’t offer a com­par­a­tive analy­sis. In com­par­i­son, the Coroflot survey boasts 4250 respon­dents from 73 coun­tries. What is clear is that in most design fields the incomes are rising nicely. On top of this, you’re best paid as a con­sul­tant. Nonethe­less there are some hard-to-explain anomolies that stick out. It turns out that design­ers in India are some of the worlds best-​paid, up there with Amer­i­cans and Aus­tralians. Hmm.