Why this page exists
MajorPays publishes figures that people may use when thinking about school, work and where to live. This page explains how those figures get onto the site, how we decide what to show and what to hold back, how we try to keep the site neutral, and what happens when something is wrong. It is a description of current practice, and it changes when practice changes; What’s new records the changes.
1. Where the numbers come from
- Government and openly licensed sources only. Data comes from U.S. government agencies, such as the Department of Education (College Scorecard and IPEDS), the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Census Bureau, the Bureau of Economic Analysis, the Department of Labor, the National Science Foundation and O*NET, or from sources that explicitly allow reuse. We do not use data from sources that restrict copying, and we do not scrape other websites for figures.
- The source is on the page. Each page names the agency, the table or survey and the year. The Data sources page lists every dataset with its terms of use.
- No personal data. The site shows group statistics, not information about individual students or workers.
2. How a figure gets published
- We download the agency’s published file, not a copy from a third party.
- A script reads the file and selects the fields we use. The script, not hand typing, produces the numbers, so the same rule applies to every school, field or place.
- We compare samples of the output with the agency’s own tables and check that totals and counts agree before pages are built.
- The page shows the figure, the year and the source, and says whether MajorPays calculated anything itself.
- When an agency releases new data, the affected pages are rebuilt and the change is listed on What’s new.
Where MajorPays calculates a figure, such as rent as a share of a bachelor’s-degree worker’s pay or a median across colleges, the page says so, and the rule is stated. We do not adjust, smooth or edit an agency’s figure to make it look better or worse.
3. Small numbers and uncertain estimates
- Small groups are hidden. A figure based on too few students, graduates or filings is withheld, because it is more likely to reflect chance than a pattern or to identify someone. Examples: group graduation rates are shown only for groups of at least 30 students, and employer filings are shown for occupations with enough certified filings (at least 30 for H-1B, at least 10 for green card applications).
- Margins of error are respected. Census survey figures for counties, cities and ZIP areas are shown only when their margin of error is small enough (for example, median earnings, income, rent and home value only when the margin is at most 20% of the estimate); unemployment rates need at least 1,000 people in the labor force.
- Estimates are labeled. Survey results, projections and provisional data are described as such, and a projection is not presented as a promise.
- Dashes are not zeros. A blank cell means the agency did not publish a figure or we withheld it, not that the value is zero.
4. Staying neutral
- No rankings of schools or places. Lists begin in alphabetical order and you can sort them yourself. We do not score, rate or review schools, programs, employers or people.
- No payment changes how anyone appears. No school, employer or agency pays to be listed, to change a figure or to change a description.
- No advice. Figures describe groups of past graduates and workers. They do not say what will happen to any person, and nothing on the site is admissions, financial, career or legal advice.
5. Corrections
If you think a figure is wrong, use the “Report an error” link at the bottom of any page or write to founder@majorpays.com, and include the page address and, if you can, the official source that shows a different number. We compare the report with the agency’s file. A mistake of ours is fixed and the correction is noted; if the number matches the agency’s data we say so and cite the source. If an agency corrects its own file, the update is loaded with the next release. Schools and agencies can ask us to review how their public figures are shown, and we answer on the same basis as anyone else.
6. Keeping the site current
Pages show the data year they use. When a federal agency publishes a new release, we update the pages that depend on it and log the change. Guides and explanations are written to describe what the data measures and are revised when the underlying data or its definitions change. Pages that are too thin to be useful on their own, such as large sets of near-identical lists, are kept out of the sitemap and are not offered to search engines.
7. Who runs the site and how it is funded
MajorPays is operated by MajorPays LLC, a Missouri limited liability company, and is not part of any college, employer or government agency. It is free to use and may be supported by advertising. Advertising never changes which data is shown or how it is ordered. See About, Privacy and Terms.
8. Using what we publish
Summary tables are free to download from Download data, with sources and license text. Please cite the original agency and link the page; how to cite MajorPays gives examples. Suggestions for new questions, data or fixes are welcome on the suggestions page.