Being a Cambridge University student gives you all those glittering benefits and perks– prestige, reputation, glamour, and perhaps more importantly, a good career with a renowned company. Now the university’s economic graduates can cherish another winner – they get the highest paid jobs around.

A survey was carried out recently to compare the salary of the university graduates across the United Kingdom (UK) and determine the earning power of a university degree.

It was found that, on average, a Cambridge University graduate in the economic subject earns about GB38,000 annually, making them the highest paid group among the 2008 university leavers.

Another interesting, but not so surprising finding is that, graduates from relatively new universities earn much lower salary, regardless of the academic fields. However, those in the arts subjects are particularly singled out as the lowest earners bunch. They sit somewhere on the low end of the scale with an average annual salary of GB12,000. The table shows that, a media graduate from Teesside University earns about GB13,000, while a creative and arts graduate from the Newcastle University gets paid about GB12,000.

Surely, this fact will raise the perennial question; is my degree qualification worth it?

Coming hot on Cambridge trail are IT graduates from London’s Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine, with earnings of well over GB30,000. Other universities whose graduates are paid more than GB30,000 per year include Oxford, London School of Economics (LSE), University College London (UCL) York University, Dundee and Queen’s Belfast.

Oxford, Imperial College, LSE and UCL are the regular faces that feature in the UK top 10 universities list on yearly basis.